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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 05:17:50 -0700 |
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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/1847-h.zip b/1847-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..cf26c23 --- /dev/null +++ b/1847-h.zip diff --git a/1847-h/1847-h.htm b/1847-h/1847-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a45229b --- /dev/null +++ b/1847-h/1847-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,2995 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="us-ascii"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + Songs, Merry and Sad, by John Charles Mcneill + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Songs, Merry and Sad, by John Charles McNeill + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. 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: Songs, Merry and Sad + +Author: John Charles McNeill + +Release Date: November 7, 2008 [EBook #1847] +Last Updated: February 6, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SONGS, MERRY AND SAD *** + + + + +Produced by Alan R. Light, and David Widger + + + + + +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h1> + SONGS, MERRY AND SAD + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + by John Charles McNeill + </h2> + <h3> + [American (North Carolina) poet. 1874-1907.] + </h3> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h4> + To<br /> <br /> JOSEPH P. CALDWELL<br /> ("The Old Man") + </h4> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <blockquote> + <p class="toc"> + <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big> + </p> + <p> + <br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <b>SONGS, MERRY AND SAD</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> The Bride </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> "Oh, Ask Me Not" </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> Isabel </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> To ——— </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> To Melvin Gardner: Suicide </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> Away Down Home </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> For Jane's Birthday </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> A Secret </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> The Old Bad Woman </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> Valentine </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> A Photograph </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> Jesse Covington </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> An Idyl </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> Home Songs </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> M. W. Ransom </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0017"> Protest </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0018"> Oblivion </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0019"> Now! </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0020"> Tommy Smith </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0021"> Before Bedtime </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0022"> "If I Could Glimpse Him" </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0023"> Attraction </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0024"> Love's Fashion </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0025"> Alcestis </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0026"> Reminiscence </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0027"> Sonnet </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0028"> Lines </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0029"> An Easter Hymn </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0030"> A Christmas Hymn </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0031"> When I Go Home </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0032"> Odessa </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0033"> Trifles </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0034"> Sunburnt Boys </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0035"> Gray Days </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0036"> An Invalid </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0037"> A Caged Mocking-Bird </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0038"> Dawn </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0039"> Harvest </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0040"> Two Pictures </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0041"> October </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0042"> The Old Clock </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0043"> Tear Stains </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0044"> A Prayer </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0045"> She Being Young </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0046"> Paul Jones </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0047"> The Drudge </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0048"> The Wife </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0049"> Vision </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0050"> September </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0051"> Barefooted </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0052"> Pardon Time </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0053"> The Rattlesnake </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0054"> The Prisoner </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0055"> Sonnet </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0056"> Folk Song </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0057"> "97": The Fast Mail </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0058"> Sundown </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0059"> At Sea </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0060"> L'envoi </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + </blockquote> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <h1> + SONGS, MERRY AND SAD + </h1> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + The Bride + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The little white bride is left alone + With him, her lord; the guests have gone; + The festal hall is dim. + No jesting now, nor answering mirth. + The hush of sleep falls on the earth + And leaves her here with him. + + Why should there be, O little white bride, + When the world has left you by his side, + A tear to brim your eyes? + Some old love-face that comes again, + Some old love-moment sweet with pain + Of passionate memories? + + Does your heart yearn back with last regret + For the maiden meads of mignonette + And the fairy-haunted wood, + That you had not withheld from love, + A little while, the freedom of + Your happy maidenhood? + + Or is it but a nameless fear, + A wordless joy, that calls the tear + In dumb appeal to rise, + When, looking on him where he stands, + You yield up all into his hands, + Pleading into his eyes? + + For days that laugh or nights that weep + You two strike oars across the deep + With life's tide at the brim; + And all time's beauty, all love's grace + Beams, little bride, upon your face + Here, looking up at him. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + "Oh, Ask Me Not" + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Love, should I set my heart upon a crown, + Squander my years, and gain it, + What recompense of pleasure could I own? + For youth's red drops would stain it. + + Much have I thought on what our lives may mean, + And what their best endeavor, + Seeing we may not come again to glean, + But, losing, lose forever. + + Seeing how zealots, making choice of pain, + From home and country parted, + Have thought it life to leave their fellows slain, + Their women broken-hearted; + + How teasing truth a thousand faces claims, + As in a broken mirror, + And what a father died for in the flames + His own son scorns as error; + + How even they whose hearts were sweet with song + Must quaff oblivion's potion, + And, soon or late, their sails be lost along + The all-surrounding ocean: + + Oh, ask me not the haven of our ships, + Nor what flag floats above you! + I hold you close, I kiss your sweet, sweet lips, + And love you, love you, love you! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Isabel + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + When first I stood before you, + Isabel, + I stood there to adore you, + In your spell; + For all that grace composes, + And all that beauty knows is + Your face above the roses, + Isabel. + + You knew the charm of flowers, + Isabel, + Which, like incarnate hours, + Rose and fell + At your bosom, glowed and gloried, + White and pale and pink and florid, + And you touched them with your forehead, + Isabel. + + Amid the jest and laughter, + Isabel, + I saw you, and thereafter, + Ill or well, + There was nothing else worth seeing, + Worth following or fleeing, + And no reason else for being, + Isabel. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + To ——— + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Some time, far hence, when Autumn sheds + Her frost upon your hair, + And you together sit at dusk, + May I come to you there? + And lightly will our hearts turn back + To this, then distant, day + When, while the world was clad in flowers, + You two were wed in May. + + When we shall sit about your board + Three old friends met again, + Joy will be with us, but not much + Of jest and laughter then; + For Autumn's large content and calm, + Like heaven's own smile, will bless + The harvest of your happy lives + With store of happiness. + + May you, who, flankt about with flowers, + Will plight your faith to-day, + Hold, evermore enthroned, the love + Which you have crowned in May; + And Time will sleep upon his scythe, + The swallow rest his wing, + Seeing that you at autumntide + Still clasp the hands of spring. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + To Melvin Gardner: Suicide + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + A flight of doves, with wanton wings, + Flash white against the sky. + In the leafy copse an oriole sings, + And a robin sings hard by. + Sun and shadow are out on the hills; + The swallow has followed the daffodils; + In leaf and blade, life throbs and thrills + Through the wild, warm heart of May. + + To have seen the sun come back, to have seen + Children again at play, + To have heard the thrush where the woods are green + Welcome the new-born day, + To have felt the soft grass cool to the feet, + To have smelt earth's incense, heavenly sweet, + To have shared the laughter along the street, + And, then, to have died in May! + + A thousand roses will blossom red, + A thousand hearts be gay, + For the summer lingers just ahead + And June is on her way; + The bee must bestir him to fill his cells, + The moon and the stars will weave new spells + Of love and the music of marriage bells— + And, oh, to be dead in May! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Away Down Home + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + 'T will not be long before they hear + The bullbat on the hill, + And in the valley through the dusk + The pastoral whippoorwill. + A few more friendly suns will call + The bluets through the loam + And star the lanes with buttercups + Away down home. + + "Knee-deep!" from reedy places + Will sing the river frogs. + The terrapins will sun themselves + On all the jutting logs. + The angler's cautious oar will leave + A trail of drifting foam + Along the shady currents + Away down home. + + The mocking-bird will feel again + The glory of his wings, + And wanton through the balmy air + And sunshine while he sings, + With a new cadence in his call, + The glint-wing'd crow will roam + From field to newly-furrowed field + Away down home. + + When dogwood blossoms mingle + With the maple's modest red, + And sweet arbutus wakes at last + From out her winter's bed, + 'T would not seem strange at all to meet + A dryad or a gnome, + Or Pan or Psyche in the woods + Away down home. + + Then come with me, thou weary heart! + Forget thy brooding ills, + Since God has come to walk among + His valleys and his hills! + The mart will never miss thee, + Nor the scholar's dusty tome, + And the Mother waits to bless thee, + Away down home. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + For Jane's Birthday + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + If fate had held a careless knife + And clipped one line that drew, + Of all the myriad lines of life, + From Eden up to you; + If, in the wars and wastes of time, + One sire had met the sword, + One mother died before her prime + Or wed some other lord; + + Or had some other age been blest, + Long past or yet to be, + And you had been the world's sweet guest + Before or after me: + I wonder how this rose would seem, + Or yonder hillside cot; + For, dear, I cannot even dream + A world where you are not! + + Thus heaven forfends that I shall drink + The gall that might have been, + If aught had broken a single link + Along the lists of men; + And heaven forgives me, whom it loves, + For feigning such distress: + My heart is happiest when it proves + Its depth of happiness. + + Enough to see you where you are, + Radiant with maiden mirth! + To bless whatever blessed star + Presided o'er your birth, + That, on this immemorial morn, + When heaven was bending low, + The gods were kind and you were born + Twenty sweet years ago! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + A Secret + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + A little baby went to sleep + One night in his white bed, + And the moon came by to take a peep + At the little baby head. + + A wind, as wandering winds will do, + Brought to the baby there + Sweet smells from some quaint flower that grew + Out on some hill somewhere. + + And wind and flower and pale moonbeam + About the baby's bed + Stirred and woke the funniest dream + In the little sleepy head. + + He thought he was all sorts of things + From a lion to a cat; + Sometimes he thought he flew on wings, + Or fell and fell, so that + + When morning broke he was right glad + But much surprised to see + Himself a soft, pink little lad + Just like he used to be. + + I would not give this story fame + If there were room to doubt it, + But when he learned to talk, he came + And told me all about it. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + The Old Bad Woman + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The Old Bad Woman was coming along, + Busily humming a sort of song. + + You could barely see, below her bonnet, + Her chin where her long nose rested on it. + + One tooth thrust out on her lower lip, + And she held one hand upon her hip. + + Then we went to thinking mighty fast, + For we knew our time had come at last. + + For what we had done and didn't do + The Old Bad Woman would put us through. + + If you cried enough to fill your hat, + She wouldn't care; she was used to that. + + Of the jam we had eaten, she would know; + How we ran barefooted in the snow; + + How we cried when they made us take our bath; + How we tied the grass across the path; + + How we bound together the cat and cur— + We couldn't deny these things to her. + + She pulled her nose up off her chin + And blinked at us with an awful grin. + + And we almost died, becaze and because + Her bony fingers looked like claws. + + When she came on up to where we were, + How could we be polite to her? + + You needn't guess how she put us through. + If you are bad, she'll visit you. + + And when she leaves and hobbles off + You'll think that she has done enough; + + For the Old Bad Woman will and can + Be just as bad as the Old Bad Man! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Valentine + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + This is the time for birds to mate; + To-day the dove + Will mark the ancient amorous date + With moans of love; + The crow will change his call to prate + His hopes thereof. + + The starling will display the red + That lights his wings; + The wren will know the sweet things said + By him who swings + And ducks and dips his crested head + And sings and sings. + + They are obedient to their blood, + Nor ask a sign, + Save buoyant air and swelling bud, + At hands divine, + But choose, each in the barren wood, + His valentine. + + In caution's maze they never wait + Until they die; + They flock the season's open gate + Ere time steals by. + Love, shall we see and imitate, + You, love, and I? +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + A Photograph + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + When in this room I turn in pondering pace + And find thine eyes upon me where I stand, + Led on, as by Enemo's silken strand, + I come and gaze and gaze upon thy face. + + Framed round by silence, poised on pearl-white grace + Of curving throat, too sweet for beaded band, + It seems as if some wizard's magic wand + Had wrought thee for the love of all the race. + + Dear face, that will not turn about to see + The tulips, glorying in the casement sun, + Or, other days, the drizzled raindrops run + + Down the damp walls, but follow only me, + Would that Pygmalion's goddess might be won + To change this lifeless image into thee! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Jesse Covington + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + If I have had some merry times + In roaming up and down the earth, + Have made some happy-hearted rhymes + And had my brimming share of mirth, + And if this song should live in fame + When my brief day is dead and gone, + Let it recall with mine the name + Of old man Jesse Covington. + + Let it recall his waggish heart— + Yeke-hey, yeke-hey, hey-diddle-diddle— + When, while the fire-logs fell apart, + He snatched the bow across his fiddle, + And looked on, with his eyes half shut, + Which meant his soul was wild with fun, + At our mad capers through the hut + Of old man Jesse Covington. + + For all the thrilling tales he told, + For all the tunes the fiddle knew, + For all the glorious nights of old + We boys and he have rollicked through, + For laughter all unknown to wealth + That roared responsive to a pun, + A hale, ripe age and ruddy health + To old man Jesse Covington! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + An Idyl + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Upon a gnarly, knotty limb + That fought the current's crest, + Where shocks of reeds peeped o'er the brim, + Wild wasps had glued their nest. + + And in a sprawling cypress' grot, + Sheltered and safe from flood, + Dirt-daubers each had chosen a spot + To shape his house of mud. + + In a warm crevice of the bark + A basking scorpion clung, + With bright blue tail and red-rimmed eyes + And yellow, twinkling tongue. + + A lunging trout flashed in the sun, + To do some petty slaughter, + And set the spiders all a-run + On little stilts of water. + + Toward noon upon the swamp there stole + A deep, cathedral hush, + Save where, from sun-splocht bough and bole, + Sweet thrush replied to thrush. + + An angler came to cast his fly + Beneath a baffling tree. + I smiled, when I had caught his eye, + And he smiled back at me. + + When stretched beside a shady elm + I watched the dozy heat, + Nature was moving in her realm, + For I could hear her feet. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Home Songs + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The little loves and sorrows are my song: + The leafy lanes and birthsteads of my sires, + Where memory broods by winter's evening fires + O'er oft-told joys, and ghosts of ancient wrong; + The little cares and carols that belong + To home-hearts, and old rustic lutes and lyres, + And spreading acres, where calm-eyed desires + Wake with the dawn, unfevered, fair, and strong. + + If words of mine might lull the bairn to sleep, + And tell the meaning in a mother's eyes; + Might counsel love, and teach their eyes to weep + Who, o'er their dead, question unanswering skies, + More worth than legions in the dust of strife, + Time, looking back at last, should count my life. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + M. W. Ransom + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + (Died October 8, 1904) +</pre> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + For him, who in a hundred battles stood + Scorning the cannon's mouth, + Grimy with flame and red with foeman's blood, + For thy sweet sake, O South; + + Who, wise as brave, yielded his conquered sword + At a vain war's surcease, + And spoke, thy champion still, the statesman's word + In the calm halls of peace; + + Who pressed the ruddy wine to thy faint lips, + Where thy torn body lay, + And saw afar time's white in-sailing ships + Bringing a happier day: + + Oh, mourn for him, dear land that gave him birth! + Bow low thy sorrowing head! + Let thy seared leaves fall silent on the earth + Whereunder he lies dead! + + In field and hall, in valor and in grace, + In wisdom's livery, + Gentle and brave, he moved with knightly pace, + A worthy son of thee! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Protest + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Oh, I am weary, weary, weary + Of Pan and oaten quills + And little songs that, from the dictionary, + Learn lore of streams and hills, + Of studied laughter, mocking what is merry, + And calculated thrills! + + Are we grown old and past the time of singing? + Is ardor quenched in art + Till art is but a formal figure, bringing + A money-measured heart, + Procrustean cut, and, with old echoes, ringing + Its bells about the mart? + + The race moves on, and leaves no wildernesses + Where rugged voices cry; + It reads its prayer, and with set phrase it blesses + The souls of men who die, + And step by even step its rank progresses, + An army marshalled by. + + If it be better so, that Babel noises, + Losing all course and ken, + And grief that wails and gladness that rejoices + Should never wake again + To shock a world of modulated voices + And mediocre men, + + Then he is blest who wears the painted feather + And may not turn about + To dusks when muses romped the dewy heather + In unrestricted rout + And dawns when, if the stars had sung together, + The sons of God would shout! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0018" id="link2H_4_0018"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Oblivion + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Green moss will creep + Along the shady graves where we shall sleep. + + Each year will bring + Another brood of birds to nest and sing. + + At dawn will go + New ploughmen to the fields we used to know. + + Night will call home + The hunter from the hills we loved to roam. + + She will not ask, + The milkmaid, singing softly at her task, + + Nor will she care + To know if I were brave or you were fair. + + No one will think + What chalice life had offered us to drink, + + When from our clay + The sun comes back to kiss the snow away. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0019" id="link2H_4_0019"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Now! + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Her brown hair knew no royal crest, + No gems nor jeweled charms, + No roses her bright cheek caressed, + No lilies kissed her arms. + In simple, modest womanhood + Clad, as was meet, in white, + The fairest flower of all, she stood + Amid the softest light. + + It had been worth a perilous quest + To see the court she drew,— + My rose, my gem, my royal crest, + My lily moist with dew; + Worth heaven, when, with farewells from each + The gay throng let us be, + To see her turn at last and reach + Her white hands out to me. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0020" id="link2H_4_0020"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Tommy Smith + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + When summer's languor drugs my veins + And fills with sleep the droning times, + Like sluggish dreams among my brains, + There runs the drollest sort of rhymes, + Idle as clouds that stray through heaven + And vague as if they were a myth, + But in these rhymes is always given + A health for old Bluebritches Smith. + + Among my thoughts of what is good + In olden times and distant lands, + Is that do-nothing neighborhood + Where the old cider-hogshead stands + To welcome with its brimming gourd + The canny crowd of kin and kith + Who meet about the bibulous board + Of old Bluebritches Tommy Smith. + + In years to come, when stealthy change + Hath stolen the cider-press away + And the gnarled orchards of the grange + Have fallen before a slow decay, + Were I so cunning, I would carve + From some time-scorning monolith + A sculpture that should well preserve + The fame of old Bluebritches Smith. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0021" id="link2H_4_0021"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Before Bedtime + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The cat sleeps in a chimney jam + With ashes in her fur, + An' Tige, from on the yuther side, + He keeps his eye on her. + + The jar o' curds is on the hearth, + An' I'm the one to turn it. + I'll crawl in bed an' go to sleep + When maw begins to churn it. + + Paw bends to read his almanax + An' study out the weather, + An' bud has got a gourd o' grease + To ile his harness leather. + + Sis looks an' looks into the fire, + Half-squintin' through her lashes, + An' I jis watch my tater where + It shoots smoke through the ashes. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0022" id="link2H_4_0022"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + "If I Could Glimpse Him" + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + When in the Scorpion circles low + The sun with fainter, dreamier light, + And at a far-off hint of snow + The giddy swallows take to flight, + And droning insects sadly know + That cooler falls the autumn night; + + When airs breathe drowsily and sweet, + Charming the woods to colors gay, + And distant pastures send the bleat + Of hungry lambs at break of day, + Old Hermes' wings grow on my feet, + And, good-by, home! I'm called away! + + There on the hills should I behold, + Sitting upon an old gray stone + That humps its back up through the mold, + And piping in a monotone, + Pan, as he sat in days of old, + My joy would bid surprise begone! + + Dear Pan! 'Tis he that calls me out; + He, lying in some hazel copse, + Where lazily he turns about + And munches each nut as it drops, + Well pleased to see me swamped in doubt + At sound of his much-changing stops. + + If I could glimpse him by the vine + Where purple fox-grapes hang their store, + I'd tell him, in his leafy shrine, + How poets say he lives no more. + He'd laugh, and pluck a muscadine, + And fall to piping, as of yore! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0023" id="link2H_4_0023"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Attraction + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + He who wills life wills its condition sweet, + Having made love its mother, joy its quest, + That its perpetual sequence might not rest + On reason's dictum, cold and too discreet; + + For reason moves with cautious, careful feet, + Debating whether life or death were best, + And why pale pain, not ruddy mirth, is guest + In many a heart which life hath set to beat. + + But I will cast my fate with love, and trust + Her honeyed heart that guides the pollened bee + And sets the happy wing-seeds fluttering free; + + And I will bless the law which saith, Thou must! + And, wet with sea or shod with weary dust, + Will follow back and back and back to thee! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0024" id="link2H_4_0024"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Love's Fashion + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Oh, I can jest with Margaret + And laugh a gay good-night, + But when I take my Helen's hand + I dare not clasp it tight. + + I dare not hold her dear white hand + More than a quivering space, + And I should bless a breeze that blew + Her hair into my face. + + 'T is Margaret I call sweet names: + Helen is too, too dear + For me to stammer little words + Of love into her ear. + + So now, good-night, fair Margaret, + And kiss me e'er we part! + But one dumb touch of Helen's hand, + And, oh, my heart, my heart! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0025" id="link2H_4_0025"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Alcestis + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Not long the living weep above their dead, + And you will grieve, Admetus, but not long. + The winter's silence in these desolate halls + Will break with April's laughter on your lips; + The bees among the flowers, the birds that mate, + The widowed year, grown gaunt with memory + And yearning toward the summer's fruits, will come + With lotus comfort, feeding all your veins. + The vining brier will crawl across my grave, + And you will woo another in my stead. + Those tender, foolish names you called me by, + Your passionate kiss that clung unsatisfied, + The pressure of your hand, when dark night hushed + Life's busy stir, and left us two alone, + Will you remember? or, when dawn creeps in, + And you bend o'er another's pillowed head, + Seeing sleep's loosened hair about her face, + Until her low love-laughter welcomes you, + Will you, down-gazing at her waking eyes, + Forget? + So have I loved you, my Admetus, + I thank the cruel fates who clip my life + To lengthen yours, they tarry not for age + To dim my eye and blanch my cheek, but now + Take me, while my lips are sweet to you + And youth hides yet amid this hair of mine, + Brown in the shadow, golden in the light. + Bend down and kiss me, dying for your sake, + Not gratefully, but sadly, love's farewell; + And if the flowering year's oblivion + Lend a new passion to thy life, far down + In the dim Stygian shadows wandering, + I will not know, but still will cherish there, + Where no change comes, thy love upon my lips. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0026" id="link2H_4_0026"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Reminiscence + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + We sang old love-songs on the way + In sad and merry snatches, + Your fingers o'er the strings astray + Strumming the random catches. + + And ever, as the skiff plied on + Among the trailing willows, + Trekking the darker deeps to shun + The gleaming sandy shallows, + + It seemed that we had, ages gone, + In some far summer weather, + When this same faery moonlight shone, + Sung these same songs together. + + And every grassy cape we passed, + And every reedy island, + Even the bank'd cloud in the west + That loomed a sombre highland; + + And you, with dewmist on your hair, + Crowned with a wreath of lilies, + Laughing like Lalage the fair + And tender-eyed like Phyllis: + + I know not if 't were here at home, + By some old wizard's orders, + Or long ago in Crete or Rome + Or fair Provencal borders, + + But now, as when a faint flame breaks + From out its smouldering embers, + My heart stirs in its sleep, and wakes, + And yet but half-remembers + + That you and I some other time + Moved through this dream of glory, + Like lovers in an ancient rhyme, + A long-forgotten story. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0027" id="link2H_4_0027"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Sonnet + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + I would that love were subject unto law! + Upon his person I should lay distraint + And force him thus to answer my complaint, + Which I, in well-considered counts, should draw. + Not free to fly, he needs must seek some flaw + To mar my pleading, though his heart were faint; + Declare his counsel to me, and acquaint + Himself with maxim, precedent, and saw. + + Ah, I could win him with authorities, + If suing thus in such a sober court; + Could read him many an ancient rhym'd report + Of such sad cases, tears would fill his eyes + And he confess a judgment, or resort + To some well-pleasing terms of compromise! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0028" id="link2H_4_0028"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Lines + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + To you, dear mother heart, whose hair is gray + Above this page to-day, + Whose face, though lined with many a smile and care, + Grows year by year more fair, + + Be tenderest tribute set in perfect rhyme, + That haply passing time + May cull and keep it for strange lips to pay + When we have gone our way; + + And, to strange men, weary of field and street, + Should this, my song, seem sweet, + Yours be the joy, for all that made it so + You know, dear heart, you know. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0029" id="link2H_4_0029"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + An Easter Hymn + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The Sun has come again and fed + The lily's lamp with light, + And raised from dust a rose, rich red, + And a little star-flower, white; + He also guards the Pleiades + And holds his planets true: + But we—we know not which of these + The easier task to do. + + But, since from heaven he stoops to breathe + A flower to balmy air, + Surely our lives are not beneath + The kindness of his care; + And, as he guides the blade that gropes + Up from the barren sod, + So, from the ashes of our hopes, + Will beauty grow toward God. + + Whate'er thy name, O Soul of Life,— + We know but that thou art,— + Thou seest, through all our waste of strife, + One groping human heart, + Weary of words and broken sight, + But moved with deep accord + To worship where thy lilies light + The altar of its Lord. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0030" id="link2H_4_0030"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + A Christmas Hymn + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Near where the shepherds watched by night + And heard the angels o'er them, + The wise men saw the starry light + Stand still at last before them. + No armored castle there to ward + His precious life from danger, + But, wrapped in common cloth, our Lord + Lay in a lowly manger. + No booming bells proclaimed his birth, + No armies marshalled by, + No iron thunders shook the earth, + No rockets clomb the sky; + The temples builded in his name + Were shapeless granite then, + And all the choirs that sang his fame + Were later breeds of men. + But, while the world about him slept, + Nor cared that he was born, + One gentle face above him kept + Its mother watch till morn; + And, if his baby eyes could tell + What grace and glory were, + No roar of gun, no boom of bell + Were worth the look of her. + Now praise to God that ere his grace + Was scorned and he reviled + He looked into his mother's face, + A little helpless child; + And praise to God that ere men strove + About his tomb in war + One loved him with a mother's love, + Nor knew a creed therefor. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0031" id="link2H_4_0031"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + When I Go Home + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + When I go home, green, green will glow the grass, + Whereon the flight of sun and cloud will pass; + Long lines of wood-ducks through the deepening gloam + Will hold above the west, as wrought on brass, + And fragrant furrows will have delved the loam, + When I go home. + + When I go home, the dogwood stars will dash + The solemn woods above the bearded ash, + The yellow-jasmine, whence its vine hath clomb, + Will blaze the valleys with its golden flash, + And every orchard flaunt its polychrome, + When I go home. + + When I go home and stroll about the farm, + The thicket and the barnyard will be warm. + Jess will be there, and Nigger Bill, and Tom— + On whom time's chisel works no hint of harm— + And, oh, 'twill be a day to rest and roam, + When I go home! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0032" id="link2H_4_0032"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Odessa + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + A horror of great darkness over them, + No cloud of fire to guide and cover them, + Beasts for the shambles, tremulous with dread, + They crouch on alien soil among their dead. + + "Thy shield and thy exceeding great reward," + This was thine ancient covenant, O Lord, + Which, sealed with mirth, these many thousand years + Is black with blood and blotted out with tears. + + Have these not toiled through Egypt's burning sun, + And wept beside the streams of Babylon, + Led from thy wilderness of hill and glen + Into a wider wilderness of men? + + Life bore them ever less of gain than loss, + Before and since Golgotha's piteous Cross, + And surely, now, their sorrow hath sufficed + For all the hate that grew from love of Christ! + + Thou great God-heart, heed thou thy people's cry, + Bare-browed and empty-handed where they die, + Sea-sundered from wall-girt Jerusalem, + There being no sword that wills to succor them,— + + And Miriam's song, long hushed, will rise to thee, + And all thy people lift their eyes to thee, + When, for the darkness' horror over them, + Thou comest, a cloud of light to cover them. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0033" id="link2H_4_0033"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Trifles + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + What shall I bring you, sweet? + A posy prankt with every April hue: + The cloud-white daisy, violet sky-blue, + Shot with the primrose sunshine through and through? + + Or shall I bring you, sweet, + Some ancient rhyme of lovers sore beset, + Whose joy is dead, whose sadness lingers yet, + That you may read, and sigh, and soon forget? + + What shall I bring you, sweet? + Was ever trifle yet so held amiss + As not to fill love's waiting heart with bliss, + And merit dalliance at a long, long kiss? +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0034" id="link2H_4_0034"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Sunburnt Boys + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Down on the Lumbee river + Where the eddies ripple cool + Your boat, I know, glides stealthily + About some shady pool. + The summer's heats have lulled asleep + The fish-hawk's chattering noise, + And all the swamp lies hushed about + You sunburnt boys. + + You see the minnow's waves that rock + The cradled lily leaves. + From a far field some farmer's song, + Singing among his sheaves, + Comes mellow to you where you sit, + Each man with boatman's poise, + There, in the shimmering water lights, + You sunburnt boys. + + I know your haunts: each gnarly bole + That guards the waterside, + Each tuft of flags and rushes where + The river reptiles hide, + Each dimpling nook wherein the bass + His eager life employs + Until he dies—the captive of + You sunburnt boys. + + You will not—will you?—soon forget + When I was one of you, + Nor love me less that time has borne + My craft to currents new; + Nor shall I ever cease to share + Your hardships and your joys, + Robust, rough-spoken, gentle-hearted + Sunburnt boys! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0035" id="link2H_4_0035"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Gray Days + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + A soaking sedge, + A faded field, a leafless hill and hedge, + + Low clouds and rain, + And loneliness and languor worse than pain. + + Mottled with moss, + Each gravestone holds to heaven a patient Cross. + + Shrill streaks of light + Two sycamores' clean-limbed, funereal white, + + And low between, + The sombre cedar and the ivy green. + + Upon the stone + Of each in turn who called this land his own + + The gray rain beats + And wraps the wet world in its flying sheets, + + And at my eaves + A slow wind, ghostlike, comes and grieves and grieves. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0036" id="link2H_4_0036"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + An Invalid + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + I care not what his name for God may be, + Nor what his wisdom holds of heaven and hell, + The alphabet whereby he strives to spell + His lines of life, nor where he bends his knee, + Since, with his grave before him, he can see + White Peace above it, while the churchyard bell + Poised in its tower, poised now, to boom his knell, + Seems but the waiting tongue of liberty. + + For names and knowledge, idle breed of breath, + And cant and creed, the progeny of strife, + Thronging the safe, companioned streets of life, + Shrink trembling from the cold, clear eye of death, + And learn too late why dying lips can smile: + That goodness is the only creed worth while. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0037" id="link2H_4_0037"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + A Caged Mocking-Bird + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + I pass a cobbler's shop along the street + And pause a moment at the door-step, where, + In nature's medley, piping cool and sweet, + The songs that thrill the swamps when spring is near, + Fly o'er the fields at fullness of the year, + And twitter where the autumn hedges run, + Join all the months of music into one. + + I shut my eyes: the shy wood-thrush is there, + And all the leaves hang still to catch his spell; + Wrens cheep among the bushes; from somewhere + A bluebird's tweedle passes o'er the fell; + From rustling corn bob-white his name doth tell; + And when the oriole sets his full heart free + Barefooted boyhood comes again to me. + + The vision-bringer hangs upon a nail + Before a dusty window, looking dim + On marts where trade goes hot with box and bale; + The sad-eyed passers have no time for him. + His captor sits, with beaded face and grim, + Plying a listless awl, as in a dream + Of pastures winding by a shady stream. + + Gray bird, what spirit bides with thee unseen? + For now, when every songster finds his love + And makes his nest where woods are deep and green, + Free as the winds, thy song should mock the dove. + If I were thou, my grief in moans should move + At thinking—otherwhere, by others' art + Charmed and forgetful—of mine own sweetheart. + + But I, who weep when fortune seems unkind + To prison me within a space of walls, + When far-off grottoes hold my loves enshrined + And every love is cruel when it calls; + Who sulk for hills and fern-fledged waterfalls,— + I blush to offer sorrow unto thee, + Master of fate, scorner of destiny! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0038" id="link2H_4_0038"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Dawn + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The hills again reach skyward with a smile. + Again, with waking life along its way, + The landscape marches westward mile on mile + And time throbs white into another day. + + Though eager life must wait on livelihood, + And all our hopes be tethered to the mart, + Lacking the eagle's wild, high freedom, would + That ours might be this day the eagle's heart! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0039" id="link2H_4_0039"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Harvest + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Cows in the stall and sheep in the fold; + Clouds in the west, deep crimson and gold; + A heron's far flight to a roost somewhere; + The twitter of killdees keen in the air; + The noise of a wagon that jolts through the gloam + On the last load home. + + There are lights in the windows; a blue spire of smoke + Climbs from the grange grove of elm and oak. + The smell of the Earth, where the night pours to her + Its dewy libation, is sweeter than myrrh, + And an incense to Toil is the smell of the loam + On the last load home. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0040" id="link2H_4_0040"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Two Pictures + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + One sits in soft light, where the hearth is warm, + A halo, like an angel's, on her hair. + She clasps a sleeping infant in her arm. + A holy presence hovers round her there, + And she, for all her mother-pains more fair, + Is happy, seeing that all sweet thoughts that stir + The hearts of men bear worship unto her. + + Another wanders where the cold wind blows, + Wet-haired, with eyes that sting one like a knife. + Homeless forever, at her bosom close + She holds the purchase of her love and life, + Of motherhood, unglorified as wife; + And bitterer than the world's relentless scorn + The knowing her child were happier never born. + + Whence are the halo and the fiery shame + That fashion thus a crown and curse of love? + Have roted words such power to bless and blame? + Ay, men have stained a raven from many a dove, + And all the grace and all the grief hereof + Are the two words which bore one's lips apart + And which the other hoarded in her heart. + + He who stooped down and wrote upon the sand, + The God-heart in him touched to tenderness, + Saw deep, saw what we cannot understand,— + We, who draw near the shrine of one to bless + The while we scourge another's sore distress, + And judge like gods between the ill and good, + The glory and the guilt of womanhood. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0041" id="link2H_4_0041"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + October + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The thought of old, dear things is in thine eyes, + O, month of memories! + Musing on days thine heart hath sorrow of, + Old joy, dead hope, dear love, + + I see thee stand where all thy sisters meet + To cast down at thy feet + The garnered largess of the fruitful year, + And on thy cheek a tear. + + Thy glory flames in every blade and leaf + To blind the eyes of grief; + Thy vineyards and thine orchards bend with fruit + That sorrow may be mute; + + A hectic splendor lights thy days to sleep, + Ere the gray dusk may creep + Sober and sad along thy dusty ways, + Like a lone nun, who prays; + + High and faint-heard thy passing migrant calls; + Thy lazy lizard sprawls + On his gray stone, and many slow winds creep + About thy hedge, asleep; + + The sun swings farther toward his love, the south, + To kiss her glowing mouth; + And Death, who steals among thy purpling bowers, + Is deeply hid in flowers. + + Would that thy streams were Lethe, and might flow + Where lotus blossoms blow, + And all the sweets wherewith thy riches bless + Might hold no bitterness! + + Would, in thy beauty, we might all forget + Dead days and old regret, + And through thy realm might fare us forth to roam, + Having no thought for home! + + And yet I feel, beneath thy queen's attire, + Woven of blood and fire, + Beneath the golden glory of thy charm + Thy mother heart beats warm, + + And if, mayhap, a wandering child of thee, + Weary of land and sea, + Should turn him homeward from his dreamer's quest + To sob upon thy breast, + + Thine arm would fold him tenderly, to prove + How thine eyes brimmed with love, + And thy dear hand, with all a mother's care, + Would rest upon his hair. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0042" id="link2H_4_0042"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + The Old Clock + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + All day low clouds and slanting rain + Have swept the woods and dimmed the plain. + Wet winds have swayed the birch and oak, + And caught and swirled away the smoke, + But, all day long, the wooden clock + Went on, Nic-noc, nic-noc. + + When deep at night I wake with fear, + And shudder in the dark to hear + The roaring storm's unguided strength, + Peace steals into my heart at length, + When, calm amid the shout and shock, + I hear, Nic-noc, nic-noc. + + And all the winter long 't is I + Who bless its sheer monotony— + Its scorn of days, which cares no whit + For time, except to measure it: + The prosy, dozy, cosy clock, + Nic-noc, nic-noc, nic-noc! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0043" id="link2H_4_0043"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Tear Stains + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Tear-marks stain from page to page + This book my fathers left to me,— + So dull that nothing but its age + Were worth its freight across the sea. + + But tear stains! When, by whom, and why? + Thus takes my fancy to its wings; + For grief is old, and one may cry + About so many things! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0044" id="link2H_4_0044"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + A Prayer + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + If many years should dim my inward sight, + Till, stirred with no emotion, + I might stand gazing at the fall of night + Across the gloaming ocean; + + Till storm, and sun, and night, vast with her stars, + Would seem an oft-told story, + And the old sorrow of heroic wars + Be faded of its glory; + + Till, hearing, while June's roses blew their musk, + The noise of field and city, + The human struggle, sinking tired at dusk, + I felt no thrill of pity; + + Till dawn should come without her old desire, + And day brood o'er her stages,— + O let me die, too frail for nature's hire, + And rest a million ages. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0045" id="link2H_4_0045"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + She Being Young + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The home of love is her blue eyes, + Wherein all joy, all beauty lies, + More sweet than hopes of paradise, + She being young. + + Speak of her with a miser's praise; + She craves no golden speech; her ways + Wind through charmed nights and magic days, + She being young. + + She is so far from pain and death, + So warm her cheek, so sweet her breath + Glad words are all the words she saith, + She being young. + + Seeing her face, it seems not far + To Troy's heroic field of war, + To Troy and all great things that are, + She being young. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0046" id="link2H_4_0046"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Paul Jones + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + A century of silent suns + Have set since he was laid on sleep, + And now they bear with booming guns + And streaming banners o'er the deep + A withered skin and clammy hair + Upon a frame of human bones: + Whose corse? We neither know nor care, + Content to name it John Paul Jones. + + His dust were as another's dust; + His bones—what boots it where they lie? + What matter where his sword is rust, + Or where, now dark, his eagle eye? + No foe need fear his arm again, + Nor love, nor praise can make him whole; + But o'er the farthest sons of men + Will brood the glory of his soul. + + Careless though cenotaph or tomb + Shall tower his country's monument, + Let banners float and cannon boom, + A million-throated shout be spent, + Until his widowed sea shall laugh + With sunlight in her mantling foam, + While, to his tomb or cenotaph, + We bid our hero welcome home. + + Twice exiled, let his ashes rest + At home, afar, or in the wave, + But keep his great heart with us, lest + Our nation's greatness find its grave; + And, while the vast deep listens by, + When armored wrong makes terms to right, + Keep on our lips his proud reply, + "Sir, I have but begun to fight!" +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0047" id="link2H_4_0047"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + The Drudge + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Repose upon her soulless face, + Dig the grave and leave her; + But breathe a prayer that, in his grace, + He who so loved this toiling race + To endless rest receive her. + + Oh, can it be the gates ajar + Wait not her humble quest, + Whose life was but a patient war + Against the death that stalked from far + With neither haste nor rest; + + To whom were sun and moon and cloud, + The streamlet's pebbly coil, + The transient, May-bound, feathered crowd, + The storm's frank fury, thunder-browed, + But witness of her toil; + + Whose weary feet knew not the bliss + Of dance by jocund reed; + Who never dallied at a kiss! + If heaven refuses her, life is + A tragedy indeed! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0048" id="link2H_4_0048"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + The Wife + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + They locked him in a prison cell, + Murky and mean. + She kissed him there a wife's farewell + The bars between. + And when she turned to go, the crowd, + Thinking to see her shamed and bowed, + Saw her pass out as calm and proud + As any queen. + + She passed a kinsman on the street, + To whose sad eyes + She made reply with smile as sweet + As April skies. + To one who loved her once and knew + The sorrow of her life, she threw + A gay word, ere his tale was due + Of sympathies. + + She met a playmate, whose red rose + Had never a thorn, + Whom fortune guided when she chose + Her marriage morn, + And, smiling, looked her in the eye; + But, seeing the tears of sympathy, + Her smile died, and she passed on by + In quiet scorn. + + They could not know how, when by night + The city slept, + A sleepless woman, still and white, + The watches kept; + How her wife-loyal heart had borne + The keen pain of a flowerless thorn, + How hot the tears that smiles and scorn + Had held unwept. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0049" id="link2H_4_0049"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Vision + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The wintry sun was pale + On hill and hedge; + The wind smote with its flail + The seeded sedge; + High up above the world, + New taught to fly, + The withered leaves were hurled + About the sky; + And there, through death and dearth, + It went and came,— + The Glory of the earth + That hath no name. + + I know not what it is; + I only know + It quivers in the bliss + Where roses blow, + That on the winter's breath + It broods in space, + And o'er the face of death + I see its face, + And start and stand between + Delight and dole, + As though mine eyes had seen + A living Soul. + + And I have followed it, + As thou hast done, + Where April shadows flit + Beneath the sun; + In dawn and dusk and star, + In joy and fear, + Have seen its glory far + And felt it near, + And dared recall his name + Who stood unshod + Before a fireless flame, + And called it God. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0050" id="link2H_4_0050"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + September + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + I have not been among the woods, + Nor seen the milk-weeds burst their hoods, + + The downy thistle-seeds take wing, + Nor the squirrel at his garnering. + + And yet I know that, up to God, + The mute month holds her goldenrod, + + That clump and copse, o'errun with vines, + Twinkle with clustered muscadines, + + And in deserted churchyard places + Dwarf apples smile with sunburnt faces. + + I know how, ere her green is shed, + The dogwood pranks herself with red; + + How the pale dawn, chilled through and through, + Comes drenched and draggled with her dew; + + How all day long the sunlight seems + As if it lit a land of dreams, + + Till evening, with her mist and cloud, + Begins to weave her royal shroud. + + If yet, as in old Homer's land, + Gods walk with mortals, hand in hand, + + Somewhere to-day, in this sweet weather, + Thinkest thou not they walk together? +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0051" id="link2H_4_0051"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Barefooted + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The girls all like to see the bluets in the lane + And the saucy johnny-jump-ups in the meadow, + But, we boys, we want to see the dogwood blooms again, + Throwin' a sort of summer-lookin' shadow; + For the very first mild mornin' when the woods are white + (And we needn't even ask a soul about it) + We leave our shoes right where we pulled them off at night, + And, barefooted once again, we run and shout it: + You may take the country over— + When the bluebird turns a rover, + And the wind is soft and hazy, + And you feel a little lazy, + And the hunters quit the possums— + It's the time for dogwood blossoms. + + We feel so light we wish there were more fences here; + We'd like to jump and jump them, all together! + No sleds for us, no guns, nor even 'simmon beer, + No nothin' but the blossoms and fair weather! + The meadow is a little sticky right at first, + But a few short days 'll wipe away that trouble. + To feel so good and gay, I wouldn't mind the worst + That could be done by any field o' stubble. + O, all the trees are seemin' sappy! + O, all the folks are smilin' happy! + And there's joy in every little bit of room; + But the happiest of them all + At the Shanghai rooster's call + Are we barefoots when the dogwoods burst abloom! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0052" id="link2H_4_0052"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Pardon Time + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Give over now; forbear. The moonlight steeps + In silver silence towered castle-keeps + And cottage crofts, where apples bend the bough. + Peace guards us round, and many a tired heart sleeps. + Let me brush back the shadow from your brow. + Give over now. + + On such a night, how sweet, how sweet is life, + Even to the insect piper with his fife! + And must your troubled face still bear the blight + Of strength that runs itself to waste in strife? + For love's own heart should throb through all the light + Of such a night. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0053" id="link2H_4_0053"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + The Rattlesnake + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Coiled like a clod, his eyes the home of hate, + Where rich the harvest bows, he lies in wait, + Linking earth's death and music, mate with mate. + + Is 't lure, or warning? Those small bells may sing + Like Ariel sirens, poised on viewless wing, + To lead stark life where mailed death is king; + + Else nature's voice, in that cold, earthy thrill, + Bids good avoid the venomed fang of ill, + And life and death fight equal in her will. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0054" id="link2H_4_0054"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + The Prisoner + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + From pacing, pacing without hope or quest + He leaned against his window-bars to rest + And smelt the breeze that crept up from the west. + + It came with sundown noises from the moors, + Of milking time and loud-voiced rural chores, + Of lumbering wagons and of closing doors. + + He caught a whiff of furrowed upland sweet, + And certain scents stole up across the street + That told him fireflies winked among the wheat. + + Over the dusk hill woke a new moon's light, + Shadowed the woods and made the waters white, + And watched above the quiet tents of night. + + Alas, that the old Mother should not know + How ached his heart to be entreated so, + Who heard her calling and who could not go! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0055" id="link2H_4_0055"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Sonnet + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + To-day was but a dead day in my hands. + Hour by hour did nothing more than pass, + Mere idle winds above the faded grass. + And I, as though a captive held in bands, + Who, seeing a pageant, wonders much, but stands + Apart, saw the sun blaze his course with brass + And sink into his fabled sea of glass + With glory of farewell to many lands. + + Thou knowest, thou who talliest life by days, + That I have suffered more than pain of toil, + Ah, more than they whose wounds are soothed with oil, + And they who see new light on beaten ways! + The prisoner I, who grasps his iron bars + And stares out into depth on depth of stars! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0056" id="link2H_4_0056"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Folk Song + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + When merry milkmaids to their cattle call + At evenfall + And voices range + Loud through the gloam from grange to quiet grange, + + Wild waif-songs from long distant lands and loves, + Like migrant doves, + Wake and give wing + To passion dust-dumb lips were wont to sing. + + The new still holds the old moon in her arms; + The ancient charms + Of dew and dusk + Still lure her nomad odors from the musk, + + And, at each day's millennial eclipse, + On new men's lips, + Some old song starts, + Made of the music of millennial hearts, + + Whereto one listens as from long ago + And learns to know + That one day's tears + And love and life are as a thousand years', + + And that some simple shepherd, singing of + His pain and love, + May haply find + His heart-song speaks the heart of all his kind. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0057" id="link2H_4_0057"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + "97": The Fast Mail + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Where the rails converge to the station yard + She stands one moment, breathing hard, + + And then, with a snort and a clang of steel, + She settles her strength to the stubborn wheel, + + And out, through the tracks that lead astray, + Cautiously, slowly she picks her way, + + And gathers her muscle and guards her nerve, + When she swings her nose to the westward curve, + + And takes the grade, which slopes to the sky, + With a bound of speed and a conquering cry. + + The hazy horizon is all she sees, + Nor cares for the meadows, stirred with bees, + + Nor the long, straight stretches of silent land, + Nor the ploughman, that shades his eye with his hand, + + Nor the cots and hamlets that know no more + Than a shriek and a flash and a flying roar; + + But, bearing her tidings, she trembles and throbs, + And laughs in her throat, and quivers and sobs; + + And the fire in her heart is a red core of heat, + That drives like a passion through forest and street, + + Till she sees the ships in their harbor at rest, + And sniffs at the trail to the end of her quest. + + If I were the driver who handles her reins, + Up hill and down hill and over the plains, + + To watch the slow mountains give back in the west, + To know the new reaches that wait every crest, + + To hold, when she swerves, with a confident clutch, + And feel how she shivers and springs to the touch, + + With the snow on her back and the sun in her face, + And nothing but time as a quarry to chase, + + I should grip hard my teeth, and look where she led, + And brace myself stooping, and give her her head, + + And urge her, and soothe her, and serve all her need, + And exult in the thunder and thrill of her speed. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0058" id="link2H_4_0058"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Sundown + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Hills, wrapped in gray, standing along the west; + Clouds, dimly lighted, gathering slowly; + The star of peace at watch above the crest— + Oh, holy, holy, holy! + + We know, O Lord, so little what is best; + Wingless, we move so lowly; + But in thy calm all-knowledge let us rest— + Oh, holy, holy, holy! +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0059" id="link2H_4_0059"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + At Sea + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + When the dim, tall sails of the ships were in motion, + Ghostly, and slow, and silent-shod, + We gazed where the dusk fled over the ocean, + A great gray hush, like the shadow of God. + + The sky dome cut with its compass in sunder + A circle of sea from the darkened land,— + A circle of tremulous waste and wonder, + O'er which one groped with a childish hand. + + The true stars came to their stations in heaven, + The false stars shivered deep down in the sea, + And the white crests went like monsters, driven + By winds that never would let them be, + + And there, where the elements mingled and muttered, + We stood, each man with a lone dumb heart, + Full of the vastness that never was uttered + By symbol of words or by echo of art. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0060" id="link2H_4_0060"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + L'envoi + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + God willed, who never needed speech, + "Let all things be:" + And, lo, the starry firmament + And land and sea + And his first thought of life that lives + In you and me. + + His circle of eternity + We see in part; + Our spirits are his breath, our hearts + Beat from his heart; + Hence we have played as little gods + And called it art. + + Lacking his power, we shared his dream + Of perfect things; + Between the tents of hope and sweet + Rememberings + Have sat in ashes, but our souls + Went forth on wings. + + Where life fell short of some desire + In you and me, + Feeling for beauty which our eyes + Could never see, + Behold, from out the void we willed + That it should be, + + And sometimes dreamed our lisping songs + Of humanhood + Might voice his silent harmony + Of waste and wood, + And he, beholding his and ours, + Might find it good. +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0061" id="link2H_4_0061"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + [End of original text.] + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2H_NOTE" id="link2H_NOTE"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Notes: + </h2> + <p> + John Charles McNeill was born in Scotland County, near Laurinburg, North + Carolina, on 26 July 1874, and died on 17 October 1907 (when he was 33 + years old). He only produced this one volume before he died, though he + planned a second, which was published posthumously. "Songs, Merry and + Sad", first published in Charlotte in 1906, went through at least five + printings over more than 60 years. (This text is taken from the very first + edition.) + </p> + <p> + Both of McNeill's grandfathers came from Scotland. + </p> + <p> + McNeill attended Wake Forest College, where he received both his + Bachelor's and Master's degrees. In 1899-1900 he taught English at Mercer + University. + </p> + <p> + Some of his poems were published nationally as early as 1901. More of his + poems were published by `The Charlotte Observer' starting in 1903, and in + 1904 he joined its staff. + </p> + <p> + This etext was created by entering the text (manually) twice, once from + the first printing (1906) and once from the second printing (no date), and + comparing the two. There were some slight differences in the two + printings. + </p> + <p> + A portrait of John Charles McNeill faces the title page (p. 3) in the + second printing, but is absent in the first. + </p> + <p> + The first printing gives the publisher as Stone & Barringer Co. and + gives the date as 1906. The second printing gives the publisher as Stone + Publishing Co., and gives no date. Both were printed in Charlotte, N.C. + </p> + <p> + One error was corrected (the second printing also corrected this error): + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + (p. 73) + [ A holy presence hovers round here there, ] + changed to: + [ A holy presence hovers round her there, ] +</pre> + <p> + The second printing also changed the title of the poem [ To Melvin + Gardner: Suicide ], on p. 19, to [ To Melvin Gardner: ]—in the text, + but not in the table of Contents. This may have been done in deference to + the family—attitudes on suicide were once quite different than now—but + as it has been quite some time, and the original title gives more meaning + to the poem, it has been retained. + </p> + <p> + The Title of the poem [ Now! ] did not have the exclamation point in the + table of Contents. It has been added to match the text. The Title of the + poem [ "97": The Fast Mail ] appeared as such in the text, but as ["97:" + The Fast Mail ] in the Contents. The latter was changed to match the text. + </p> + <p> + In the original, the book's title does not separate the Contents from the + first poem. It has been placed there as a sort of divider. + </p> + <p> + In two places ASCII fails to provide enough characters for a correct + rendering. They are the words Provencal (the c with a cedilla) and mailed + (the e with an acute accent, to indicate that the word is to be said with + two syllables). These occur in "Reminiscence" and "The Rattlesnake". + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Songs, Merry and Sad, by John Charles McNeill + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SONGS, MERRY AND SAD *** + +***** This file should be named 1847-h.htm or 1847-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/4/1847/ + +Produced by Alan R. Light, and David Widger + +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: Songs, Merry and Sad + +Author: John Charles McNeill + +Posting Date: November 7, 2008 [EBook #1847] +Release Date: August, 1999 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SONGS, MERRY AND SAD *** + + + + +Produced by Alan R. Light + + + + + +SONGS, MERRY AND SAD + +by John Charles McNeill + +[American (North Carolina) poet. 1874-1907.] + + + + To + JOSEPH P. CALDWELL + ("The Old Man") + + + + +Contents + + + The Bride + "Oh, Ask Me Not" + Isabel + To ------ + To Melvin Gardner: Suicide + Away Down Home + For Jane's Birthday + A Secret + The Old Bad Woman + Valentine + A Photograph + Jesse Covington + An Idyl + Home Songs + M. W. Ransom + Protest + Oblivion + Now! + Tommy Smith + Before Bedtime + "If I Could Glimpse Him" + Attraction + Love's Fashion + Alcestis + Reminiscence + Sonnet + Lines + An Easter Hymn + A Christmas Hymn + When I Go Home + Odessa + Trifles + Sunburnt Boys + Gray Days + An Invalid + A Caged Mocking-Bird + Dawn + Harvest + Two Pictures + October + The Old Clock + Tear Stains + A Prayer + She Being Young + Paul Jones + The Drudge + The Wife + Vision + September + Barefooted + Pardon Time + The Rattlesnake + The Prisoner + Sonnet + Folk Song + "97": The Fast Mail + Sundown + At Sea + L'envoi + + + + +SONGS, MERRY AND SAD + + + + +The Bride + + + + The little white bride is left alone + With him, her lord; the guests have gone; + The festal hall is dim. + No jesting now, nor answering mirth. + The hush of sleep falls on the earth + And leaves her here with him. + + Why should there be, O little white bride, + When the world has left you by his side, + A tear to brim your eyes? + Some old love-face that comes again, + Some old love-moment sweet with pain + Of passionate memories? + + Does your heart yearn back with last regret + For the maiden meads of mignonette + And the fairy-haunted wood, + That you had not withheld from love, + A little while, the freedom of + Your happy maidenhood? + + Or is it but a nameless fear, + A wordless joy, that calls the tear + In dumb appeal to rise, + When, looking on him where he stands, + You yield up all into his hands, + Pleading into his eyes? + + For days that laugh or nights that weep + You two strike oars across the deep + With life's tide at the brim; + And all time's beauty, all love's grace + Beams, little bride, upon your face + Here, looking up at him. + + + + +"Oh, Ask Me Not" + + + + Love, should I set my heart upon a crown, + Squander my years, and gain it, + What recompense of pleasure could I own? + For youth's red drops would stain it. + + Much have I thought on what our lives may mean, + And what their best endeavor, + Seeing we may not come again to glean, + But, losing, lose forever. + + Seeing how zealots, making choice of pain, + From home and country parted, + Have thought it life to leave their fellows slain, + Their women broken-hearted; + + How teasing truth a thousand faces claims, + As in a broken mirror, + And what a father died for in the flames + His own son scorns as error; + + How even they whose hearts were sweet with song + Must quaff oblivion's potion, + And, soon or late, their sails be lost along + The all-surrounding ocean: + + Oh, ask me not the haven of our ships, + Nor what flag floats above you! + I hold you close, I kiss your sweet, sweet lips, + And love you, love you, love you! + + + + +Isabel + + + + When first I stood before you, + Isabel, + I stood there to adore you, + In your spell; + For all that grace composes, + And all that beauty knows is + Your face above the roses, + Isabel. + + You knew the charm of flowers, + Isabel, + Which, like incarnate hours, + Rose and fell + At your bosom, glowed and gloried, + White and pale and pink and florid, + And you touched them with your forehead, + Isabel. + + Amid the jest and laughter, + Isabel, + I saw you, and thereafter, + Ill or well, + There was nothing else worth seeing, + Worth following or fleeing, + And no reason else for being, + Isabel. + + + + +To ------ + + + + Some time, far hence, when Autumn sheds + Her frost upon your hair, + And you together sit at dusk, + May I come to you there? + And lightly will our hearts turn back + To this, then distant, day + When, while the world was clad in flowers, + You two were wed in May. + + When we shall sit about your board + Three old friends met again, + Joy will be with us, but not much + Of jest and laughter then; + For Autumn's large content and calm, + Like heaven's own smile, will bless + The harvest of your happy lives + With store of happiness. + + May you, who, flankt about with flowers, + Will plight your faith to-day, + Hold, evermore enthroned, the love + Which you have crowned in May; + And Time will sleep upon his scythe, + The swallow rest his wing, + Seeing that you at autumntide + Still clasp the hands of spring. + + + + +To Melvin Gardner: Suicide + + + + A flight of doves, with wanton wings, + Flash white against the sky. + In the leafy copse an oriole sings, + And a robin sings hard by. + Sun and shadow are out on the hills; + The swallow has followed the daffodils; + In leaf and blade, life throbs and thrills + Through the wild, warm heart of May. + + To have seen the sun come back, to have seen + Children again at play, + To have heard the thrush where the woods are green + Welcome the new-born day, + To have felt the soft grass cool to the feet, + To have smelt earth's incense, heavenly sweet, + To have shared the laughter along the street, + And, then, to have died in May! + + A thousand roses will blossom red, + A thousand hearts be gay, + For the summer lingers just ahead + And June is on her way; + The bee must bestir him to fill his cells, + The moon and the stars will weave new spells + Of love and the music of marriage bells-- + And, oh, to be dead in May! + + + + +Away Down Home + + + + 'T will not be long before they hear + The bullbat on the hill, + And in the valley through the dusk + The pastoral whippoorwill. + A few more friendly suns will call + The bluets through the loam + And star the lanes with buttercups + Away down home. + + "Knee-deep!" from reedy places + Will sing the river frogs. + The terrapins will sun themselves + On all the jutting logs. + The angler's cautious oar will leave + A trail of drifting foam + Along the shady currents + Away down home. + + The mocking-bird will feel again + The glory of his wings, + And wanton through the balmy air + And sunshine while he sings, + With a new cadence in his call, + The glint-wing'd crow will roam + From field to newly-furrowed field + Away down home. + + When dogwood blossoms mingle + With the maple's modest red, + And sweet arbutus wakes at last + From out her winter's bed, + 'T would not seem strange at all to meet + A dryad or a gnome, + Or Pan or Psyche in the woods + Away down home. + + Then come with me, thou weary heart! + Forget thy brooding ills, + Since God has come to walk among + His valleys and his hills! + The mart will never miss thee, + Nor the scholar's dusty tome, + And the Mother waits to bless thee, + Away down home. + + + + +For Jane's Birthday + + + + If fate had held a careless knife + And clipped one line that drew, + Of all the myriad lines of life, + From Eden up to you; + If, in the wars and wastes of time, + One sire had met the sword, + One mother died before her prime + Or wed some other lord; + + Or had some other age been blest, + Long past or yet to be, + And you had been the world's sweet guest + Before or after me: + I wonder how this rose would seem, + Or yonder hillside cot; + For, dear, I cannot even dream + A world where you are not! + + Thus heaven forfends that I shall drink + The gall that might have been, + If aught had broken a single link + Along the lists of men; + And heaven forgives me, whom it loves, + For feigning such distress: + My heart is happiest when it proves + Its depth of happiness. + + Enough to see you where you are, + Radiant with maiden mirth! + To bless whatever blessed star + Presided o'er your birth, + That, on this immemorial morn, + When heaven was bending low, + The gods were kind and you were born + Twenty sweet years ago! + + + + +A Secret + + + + A little baby went to sleep + One night in his white bed, + And the moon came by to take a peep + At the little baby head. + + A wind, as wandering winds will do, + Brought to the baby there + Sweet smells from some quaint flower that grew + Out on some hill somewhere. + + And wind and flower and pale moonbeam + About the baby's bed + Stirred and woke the funniest dream + In the little sleepy head. + + He thought he was all sorts of things + From a lion to a cat; + Sometimes he thought he flew on wings, + Or fell and fell, so that + + When morning broke he was right glad + But much surprised to see + Himself a soft, pink little lad + Just like he used to be. + + I would not give this story fame + If there were room to doubt it, + But when he learned to talk, he came + And told me all about it. + + + + +The Old Bad Woman + + + + The Old Bad Woman was coming along, + Busily humming a sort of song. + + You could barely see, below her bonnet, + Her chin where her long nose rested on it. + + One tooth thrust out on her lower lip, + And she held one hand upon her hip. + + Then we went to thinking mighty fast, + For we knew our time had come at last. + + For what we had done and didn't do + The Old Bad Woman would put us through. + + If you cried enough to fill your hat, + She wouldn't care; she was used to that. + + Of the jam we had eaten, she would know; + How we ran barefooted in the snow; + + How we cried when they made us take our bath; + How we tied the grass across the path; + + How we bound together the cat and cur-- + We couldn't deny these things to her. + + She pulled her nose up off her chin + And blinked at us with an awful grin. + + And we almost died, becaze and because + Her bony fingers looked like claws. + + When she came on up to where we were, + How could we be polite to her? + + You needn't guess how she put us through. + If you are bad, she'll visit you. + + And when she leaves and hobbles off + You'll think that she has done enough; + + For the Old Bad Woman will and can + Be just as bad as the Old Bad Man! + + + + +Valentine + + + + This is the time for birds to mate; + To-day the dove + Will mark the ancient amorous date + With moans of love; + The crow will change his call to prate + His hopes thereof. + + The starling will display the red + That lights his wings; + The wren will know the sweet things said + By him who swings + And ducks and dips his crested head + And sings and sings. + + They are obedient to their blood, + Nor ask a sign, + Save buoyant air and swelling bud, + At hands divine, + But choose, each in the barren wood, + His valentine. + + In caution's maze they never wait + Until they die; + They flock the season's open gate + Ere time steals by. + Love, shall we see and imitate, + You, love, and I? + + + + +A Photograph + + + + When in this room I turn in pondering pace + And find thine eyes upon me where I stand, + Led on, as by Enemo's silken strand, + I come and gaze and gaze upon thy face. + + Framed round by silence, poised on pearl-white grace + Of curving throat, too sweet for beaded band, + It seems as if some wizard's magic wand + Had wrought thee for the love of all the race. + + Dear face, that will not turn about to see + The tulips, glorying in the casement sun, + Or, other days, the drizzled raindrops run + + Down the damp walls, but follow only me, + Would that Pygmalion's goddess might be won + To change this lifeless image into thee! + + + + +Jesse Covington + + + + If I have had some merry times + In roaming up and down the earth, + Have made some happy-hearted rhymes + And had my brimming share of mirth, + And if this song should live in fame + When my brief day is dead and gone, + Let it recall with mine the name + Of old man Jesse Covington. + + Let it recall his waggish heart-- + Yeke-hey, yeke-hey, hey-diddle-diddle-- + When, while the fire-logs fell apart, + He snatched the bow across his fiddle, + And looked on, with his eyes half shut, + Which meant his soul was wild with fun, + At our mad capers through the hut + Of old man Jesse Covington. + + For all the thrilling tales he told, + For all the tunes the fiddle knew, + For all the glorious nights of old + We boys and he have rollicked through, + For laughter all unknown to wealth + That roared responsive to a pun, + A hale, ripe age and ruddy health + To old man Jesse Covington! + + + + +An Idyl + + + + Upon a gnarly, knotty limb + That fought the current's crest, + Where shocks of reeds peeped o'er the brim, + Wild wasps had glued their nest. + + And in a sprawling cypress' grot, + Sheltered and safe from flood, + Dirt-daubers each had chosen a spot + To shape his house of mud. + + In a warm crevice of the bark + A basking scorpion clung, + With bright blue tail and red-rimmed eyes + And yellow, twinkling tongue. + + A lunging trout flashed in the sun, + To do some petty slaughter, + And set the spiders all a-run + On little stilts of water. + + Toward noon upon the swamp there stole + A deep, cathedral hush, + Save where, from sun-splocht bough and bole, + Sweet thrush replied to thrush. + + An angler came to cast his fly + Beneath a baffling tree. + I smiled, when I had caught his eye, + And he smiled back at me. + + When stretched beside a shady elm + I watched the dozy heat, + Nature was moving in her realm, + For I could hear her feet. + + + + +Home Songs + + + + The little loves and sorrows are my song: + The leafy lanes and birthsteads of my sires, + Where memory broods by winter's evening fires + O'er oft-told joys, and ghosts of ancient wrong; + The little cares and carols that belong + To home-hearts, and old rustic lutes and lyres, + And spreading acres, where calm-eyed desires + Wake with the dawn, unfevered, fair, and strong. + + If words of mine might lull the bairn to sleep, + And tell the meaning in a mother's eyes; + Might counsel love, and teach their eyes to weep + Who, o'er their dead, question unanswering skies, + More worth than legions in the dust of strife, + Time, looking back at last, should count my life. + + + + +M. W. Ransom + + (Died October 8, 1904) + + + + For him, who in a hundred battles stood + Scorning the cannon's mouth, + Grimy with flame and red with foeman's blood, + For thy sweet sake, O South; + + Who, wise as brave, yielded his conquered sword + At a vain war's surcease, + And spoke, thy champion still, the statesman's word + In the calm halls of peace; + + Who pressed the ruddy wine to thy faint lips, + Where thy torn body lay, + And saw afar time's white in-sailing ships + Bringing a happier day: + + Oh, mourn for him, dear land that gave him birth! + Bow low thy sorrowing head! + Let thy seared leaves fall silent on the earth + Whereunder he lies dead! + + In field and hall, in valor and in grace, + In wisdom's livery, + Gentle and brave, he moved with knightly pace, + A worthy son of thee! + + + + +Protest + + + + Oh, I am weary, weary, weary + Of Pan and oaten quills + And little songs that, from the dictionary, + Learn lore of streams and hills, + Of studied laughter, mocking what is merry, + And calculated thrills! + + Are we grown old and past the time of singing? + Is ardor quenched in art + Till art is but a formal figure, bringing + A money-measured heart, + Procrustean cut, and, with old echoes, ringing + Its bells about the mart? + + The race moves on, and leaves no wildernesses + Where rugged voices cry; + It reads its prayer, and with set phrase it blesses + The souls of men who die, + And step by even step its rank progresses, + An army marshalled by. + + If it be better so, that Babel noises, + Losing all course and ken, + And grief that wails and gladness that rejoices + Should never wake again + To shock a world of modulated voices + And mediocre men, + + Then he is blest who wears the painted feather + And may not turn about + To dusks when muses romped the dewy heather + In unrestricted rout + And dawns when, if the stars had sung together, + The sons of God would shout! + + + + +Oblivion + + + + Green moss will creep + Along the shady graves where we shall sleep. + + Each year will bring + Another brood of birds to nest and sing. + + At dawn will go + New ploughmen to the fields we used to know. + + Night will call home + The hunter from the hills we loved to roam. + + She will not ask, + The milkmaid, singing softly at her task, + + Nor will she care + To know if I were brave or you were fair. + + No one will think + What chalice life had offered us to drink, + + When from our clay + The sun comes back to kiss the snow away. + + + + +Now! + + + + Her brown hair knew no royal crest, + No gems nor jeweled charms, + No roses her bright cheek caressed, + No lilies kissed her arms. + In simple, modest womanhood + Clad, as was meet, in white, + The fairest flower of all, she stood + Amid the softest light. + + It had been worth a perilous quest + To see the court she drew,-- + My rose, my gem, my royal crest, + My lily moist with dew; + Worth heaven, when, with farewells from each + The gay throng let us be, + To see her turn at last and reach + Her white hands out to me. + + + + +Tommy Smith + + + + When summer's languor drugs my veins + And fills with sleep the droning times, + Like sluggish dreams among my brains, + There runs the drollest sort of rhymes, + Idle as clouds that stray through heaven + And vague as if they were a myth, + But in these rhymes is always given + A health for old Bluebritches Smith. + + Among my thoughts of what is good + In olden times and distant lands, + Is that do-nothing neighborhood + Where the old cider-hogshead stands + To welcome with its brimming gourd + The canny crowd of kin and kith + Who meet about the bibulous board + Of old Bluebritches Tommy Smith. + + In years to come, when stealthy change + Hath stolen the cider-press away + And the gnarled orchards of the grange + Have fallen before a slow decay, + Were I so cunning, I would carve + From some time-scorning monolith + A sculpture that should well preserve + The fame of old Bluebritches Smith. + + + + +Before Bedtime + + + + The cat sleeps in a chimney jam + With ashes in her fur, + An' Tige, from on the yuther side, + He keeps his eye on her. + + The jar o' curds is on the hearth, + An' I'm the one to turn it. + I'll crawl in bed an' go to sleep + When maw begins to churn it. + + Paw bends to read his almanax + An' study out the weather, + An' bud has got a gourd o' grease + To ile his harness leather. + + Sis looks an' looks into the fire, + Half-squintin' through her lashes, + An' I jis watch my tater where + It shoots smoke through the ashes. + + + + +"If I Could Glimpse Him" + + + + When in the Scorpion circles low + The sun with fainter, dreamier light, + And at a far-off hint of snow + The giddy swallows take to flight, + And droning insects sadly know + That cooler falls the autumn night; + + When airs breathe drowsily and sweet, + Charming the woods to colors gay, + And distant pastures send the bleat + Of hungry lambs at break of day, + Old Hermes' wings grow on my feet, + And, good-by, home! I'm called away! + + There on the hills should I behold, + Sitting upon an old gray stone + That humps its back up through the mold, + And piping in a monotone, + Pan, as he sat in days of old, + My joy would bid surprise begone! + + Dear Pan! 'Tis he that calls me out; + He, lying in some hazel copse, + Where lazily he turns about + And munches each nut as it drops, + Well pleased to see me swamped in doubt + At sound of his much-changing stops. + + If I could glimpse him by the vine + Where purple fox-grapes hang their store, + I'd tell him, in his leafy shrine, + How poets say he lives no more. + He'd laugh, and pluck a muscadine, + And fall to piping, as of yore! + + + + +Attraction + + + + He who wills life wills its condition sweet, + Having made love its mother, joy its quest, + That its perpetual sequence might not rest + On reason's dictum, cold and too discreet; + + For reason moves with cautious, careful feet, + Debating whether life or death were best, + And why pale pain, not ruddy mirth, is guest + In many a heart which life hath set to beat. + + But I will cast my fate with love, and trust + Her honeyed heart that guides the pollened bee + And sets the happy wing-seeds fluttering free; + + And I will bless the law which saith, Thou must! + And, wet with sea or shod with weary dust, + Will follow back and back and back to thee! + + + + +Love's Fashion + + + + Oh, I can jest with Margaret + And laugh a gay good-night, + But when I take my Helen's hand + I dare not clasp it tight. + + I dare not hold her dear white hand + More than a quivering space, + And I should bless a breeze that blew + Her hair into my face. + + 'T is Margaret I call sweet names: + Helen is too, too dear + For me to stammer little words + Of love into her ear. + + So now, good-night, fair Margaret, + And kiss me e'er we part! + But one dumb touch of Helen's hand, + And, oh, my heart, my heart! + + + + +Alcestis + + + + Not long the living weep above their dead, + And you will grieve, Admetus, but not long. + The winter's silence in these desolate halls + Will break with April's laughter on your lips; + The bees among the flowers, the birds that mate, + The widowed year, grown gaunt with memory + And yearning toward the summer's fruits, will come + With lotus comfort, feeding all your veins. + The vining brier will crawl across my grave, + And you will woo another in my stead. + Those tender, foolish names you called me by, + Your passionate kiss that clung unsatisfied, + The pressure of your hand, when dark night hushed + Life's busy stir, and left us two alone, + Will you remember? or, when dawn creeps in, + And you bend o'er another's pillowed head, + Seeing sleep's loosened hair about her face, + Until her low love-laughter welcomes you, + Will you, down-gazing at her waking eyes, + Forget? + So have I loved you, my Admetus, + I thank the cruel fates who clip my life + To lengthen yours, they tarry not for age + To dim my eye and blanch my cheek, but now + Take me, while my lips are sweet to you + And youth hides yet amid this hair of mine, + Brown in the shadow, golden in the light. + Bend down and kiss me, dying for your sake, + Not gratefully, but sadly, love's farewell; + And if the flowering year's oblivion + Lend a new passion to thy life, far down + In the dim Stygian shadows wandering, + I will not know, but still will cherish there, + Where no change comes, thy love upon my lips. + + + + +Reminiscence + + + + We sang old love-songs on the way + In sad and merry snatches, + Your fingers o'er the strings astray + Strumming the random catches. + + And ever, as the skiff plied on + Among the trailing willows, + Trekking the darker deeps to shun + The gleaming sandy shallows, + + It seemed that we had, ages gone, + In some far summer weather, + When this same faery moonlight shone, + Sung these same songs together. + + And every grassy cape we passed, + And every reedy island, + Even the bank'd cloud in the west + That loomed a sombre highland; + + And you, with dewmist on your hair, + Crowned with a wreath of lilies, + Laughing like Lalage the fair + And tender-eyed like Phyllis: + + I know not if 't were here at home, + By some old wizard's orders, + Or long ago in Crete or Rome + Or fair Provencal borders, + + But now, as when a faint flame breaks + From out its smouldering embers, + My heart stirs in its sleep, and wakes, + And yet but half-remembers + + That you and I some other time + Moved through this dream of glory, + Like lovers in an ancient rhyme, + A long-forgotten story. + + + + +Sonnet + + + + I would that love were subject unto law! + Upon his person I should lay distraint + And force him thus to answer my complaint, + Which I, in well-considered counts, should draw. + Not free to fly, he needs must seek some flaw + To mar my pleading, though his heart were faint; + Declare his counsel to me, and acquaint + Himself with maxim, precedent, and saw. + + Ah, I could win him with authorities, + If suing thus in such a sober court; + Could read him many an ancient rhym'd report + Of such sad cases, tears would fill his eyes + And he confess a judgment, or resort + To some well-pleasing terms of compromise! + + + + +Lines + + + + To you, dear mother heart, whose hair is gray + Above this page to-day, + Whose face, though lined with many a smile and care, + Grows year by year more fair, + + Be tenderest tribute set in perfect rhyme, + That haply passing time + May cull and keep it for strange lips to pay + When we have gone our way; + + And, to strange men, weary of field and street, + Should this, my song, seem sweet, + Yours be the joy, for all that made it so + You know, dear heart, you know. + + + + +An Easter Hymn + + + + The Sun has come again and fed + The lily's lamp with light, + And raised from dust a rose, rich red, + And a little star-flower, white; + He also guards the Pleiades + And holds his planets true: + But we--we know not which of these + The easier task to do. + + But, since from heaven he stoops to breathe + A flower to balmy air, + Surely our lives are not beneath + The kindness of his care; + And, as he guides the blade that gropes + Up from the barren sod, + So, from the ashes of our hopes, + Will beauty grow toward God. + + Whate'er thy name, O Soul of Life,-- + We know but that thou art,-- + Thou seest, through all our waste of strife, + One groping human heart, + Weary of words and broken sight, + But moved with deep accord + To worship where thy lilies light + The altar of its Lord. + + + + +A Christmas Hymn + + + + Near where the shepherds watched by night + And heard the angels o'er them, + The wise men saw the starry light + Stand still at last before them. + No armored castle there to ward + His precious life from danger, + But, wrapped in common cloth, our Lord + Lay in a lowly manger. + No booming bells proclaimed his birth, + No armies marshalled by, + No iron thunders shook the earth, + No rockets clomb the sky; + The temples builded in his name + Were shapeless granite then, + And all the choirs that sang his fame + Were later breeds of men. + But, while the world about him slept, + Nor cared that he was born, + One gentle face above him kept + Its mother watch till morn; + And, if his baby eyes could tell + What grace and glory were, + No roar of gun, no boom of bell + Were worth the look of her. + Now praise to God that ere his grace + Was scorned and he reviled + He looked into his mother's face, + A little helpless child; + And praise to God that ere men strove + About his tomb in war + One loved him with a mother's love, + Nor knew a creed therefor. + + + + +When I Go Home + + + + When I go home, green, green will glow the grass, + Whereon the flight of sun and cloud will pass; + Long lines of wood-ducks through the deepening gloam + Will hold above the west, as wrought on brass, + And fragrant furrows will have delved the loam, + When I go home. + + When I go home, the dogwood stars will dash + The solemn woods above the bearded ash, + The yellow-jasmine, whence its vine hath clomb, + Will blaze the valleys with its golden flash, + And every orchard flaunt its polychrome, + When I go home. + + When I go home and stroll about the farm, + The thicket and the barnyard will be warm. + Jess will be there, and Nigger Bill, and Tom-- + On whom time's chisel works no hint of harm-- + And, oh, 'twill be a day to rest and roam, + When I go home! + + + + +Odessa + + + + A horror of great darkness over them, + No cloud of fire to guide and cover them, + Beasts for the shambles, tremulous with dread, + They crouch on alien soil among their dead. + + "Thy shield and thy exceeding great reward," + This was thine ancient covenant, O Lord, + Which, sealed with mirth, these many thousand years + Is black with blood and blotted out with tears. + + Have these not toiled through Egypt's burning sun, + And wept beside the streams of Babylon, + Led from thy wilderness of hill and glen + Into a wider wilderness of men? + + Life bore them ever less of gain than loss, + Before and since Golgotha's piteous Cross, + And surely, now, their sorrow hath sufficed + For all the hate that grew from love of Christ! + + Thou great God-heart, heed thou thy people's cry, + Bare-browed and empty-handed where they die, + Sea-sundered from wall-girt Jerusalem, + There being no sword that wills to succor them,-- + + And Miriam's song, long hushed, will rise to thee, + And all thy people lift their eyes to thee, + When, for the darkness' horror over them, + Thou comest, a cloud of light to cover them. + + + + +Trifles + + + + What shall I bring you, sweet? + A posy prankt with every April hue: + The cloud-white daisy, violet sky-blue, + Shot with the primrose sunshine through and through? + + Or shall I bring you, sweet, + Some ancient rhyme of lovers sore beset, + Whose joy is dead, whose sadness lingers yet, + That you may read, and sigh, and soon forget? + + What shall I bring you, sweet? + Was ever trifle yet so held amiss + As not to fill love's waiting heart with bliss, + And merit dalliance at a long, long kiss? + + + + +Sunburnt Boys + + + + Down on the Lumbee river + Where the eddies ripple cool + Your boat, I know, glides stealthily + About some shady pool. + The summer's heats have lulled asleep + The fish-hawk's chattering noise, + And all the swamp lies hushed about + You sunburnt boys. + + You see the minnow's waves that rock + The cradled lily leaves. + From a far field some farmer's song, + Singing among his sheaves, + Comes mellow to you where you sit, + Each man with boatman's poise, + There, in the shimmering water lights, + You sunburnt boys. + + I know your haunts: each gnarly bole + That guards the waterside, + Each tuft of flags and rushes where + The river reptiles hide, + Each dimpling nook wherein the bass + His eager life employs + Until he dies--the captive of + You sunburnt boys. + + You will not--will you?--soon forget + When I was one of you, + Nor love me less that time has borne + My craft to currents new; + Nor shall I ever cease to share + Your hardships and your joys, + Robust, rough-spoken, gentle-hearted + Sunburnt boys! + + + + +Gray Days + + + + A soaking sedge, + A faded field, a leafless hill and hedge, + + Low clouds and rain, + And loneliness and languor worse than pain. + + Mottled with moss, + Each gravestone holds to heaven a patient Cross. + + Shrill streaks of light + Two sycamores' clean-limbed, funereal white, + + And low between, + The sombre cedar and the ivy green. + + Upon the stone + Of each in turn who called this land his own + + The gray rain beats + And wraps the wet world in its flying sheets, + + And at my eaves + A slow wind, ghostlike, comes and grieves and grieves. + + + + +An Invalid + + + + I care not what his name for God may be, + Nor what his wisdom holds of heaven and hell, + The alphabet whereby he strives to spell + His lines of life, nor where he bends his knee, + Since, with his grave before him, he can see + White Peace above it, while the churchyard bell + Poised in its tower, poised now, to boom his knell, + Seems but the waiting tongue of liberty. + + For names and knowledge, idle breed of breath, + And cant and creed, the progeny of strife, + Thronging the safe, companioned streets of life, + Shrink trembling from the cold, clear eye of death, + And learn too late why dying lips can smile: + That goodness is the only creed worth while. + + + + +A Caged Mocking-Bird + + + + I pass a cobbler's shop along the street + And pause a moment at the door-step, where, + In nature's medley, piping cool and sweet, + The songs that thrill the swamps when spring is near, + Fly o'er the fields at fullness of the year, + And twitter where the autumn hedges run, + Join all the months of music into one. + + I shut my eyes: the shy wood-thrush is there, + And all the leaves hang still to catch his spell; + Wrens cheep among the bushes; from somewhere + A bluebird's tweedle passes o'er the fell; + From rustling corn bob-white his name doth tell; + And when the oriole sets his full heart free + Barefooted boyhood comes again to me. + + The vision-bringer hangs upon a nail + Before a dusty window, looking dim + On marts where trade goes hot with box and bale; + The sad-eyed passers have no time for him. + His captor sits, with beaded face and grim, + Plying a listless awl, as in a dream + Of pastures winding by a shady stream. + + Gray bird, what spirit bides with thee unseen? + For now, when every songster finds his love + And makes his nest where woods are deep and green, + Free as the winds, thy song should mock the dove. + If I were thou, my grief in moans should move + At thinking--otherwhere, by others' art + Charmed and forgetful--of mine own sweetheart. + + But I, who weep when fortune seems unkind + To prison me within a space of walls, + When far-off grottoes hold my loves enshrined + And every love is cruel when it calls; + Who sulk for hills and fern-fledged waterfalls,-- + I blush to offer sorrow unto thee, + Master of fate, scorner of destiny! + + + + +Dawn + + + + The hills again reach skyward with a smile. + Again, with waking life along its way, + The landscape marches westward mile on mile + And time throbs white into another day. + + Though eager life must wait on livelihood, + And all our hopes be tethered to the mart, + Lacking the eagle's wild, high freedom, would + That ours might be this day the eagle's heart! + + + + +Harvest + + + + Cows in the stall and sheep in the fold; + Clouds in the west, deep crimson and gold; + A heron's far flight to a roost somewhere; + The twitter of killdees keen in the air; + The noise of a wagon that jolts through the gloam + On the last load home. + + There are lights in the windows; a blue spire of smoke + Climbs from the grange grove of elm and oak. + The smell of the Earth, where the night pours to her + Its dewy libation, is sweeter than myrrh, + And an incense to Toil is the smell of the loam + On the last load home. + + + + +Two Pictures + + + + One sits in soft light, where the hearth is warm, + A halo, like an angel's, on her hair. + She clasps a sleeping infant in her arm. + A holy presence hovers round her there, + And she, for all her mother-pains more fair, + Is happy, seeing that all sweet thoughts that stir + The hearts of men bear worship unto her. + + Another wanders where the cold wind blows, + Wet-haired, with eyes that sting one like a knife. + Homeless forever, at her bosom close + She holds the purchase of her love and life, + Of motherhood, unglorified as wife; + And bitterer than the world's relentless scorn + The knowing her child were happier never born. + + Whence are the halo and the fiery shame + That fashion thus a crown and curse of love? + Have roted words such power to bless and blame? + Ay, men have stained a raven from many a dove, + And all the grace and all the grief hereof + Are the two words which bore one's lips apart + And which the other hoarded in her heart. + + He who stooped down and wrote upon the sand, + The God-heart in him touched to tenderness, + Saw deep, saw what we cannot understand,-- + We, who draw near the shrine of one to bless + The while we scourge another's sore distress, + And judge like gods between the ill and good, + The glory and the guilt of womanhood. + + + + +October + + + + The thought of old, dear things is in thine eyes, + O, month of memories! + Musing on days thine heart hath sorrow of, + Old joy, dead hope, dear love, + + I see thee stand where all thy sisters meet + To cast down at thy feet + The garnered largess of the fruitful year, + And on thy cheek a tear. + + Thy glory flames in every blade and leaf + To blind the eyes of grief; + Thy vineyards and thine orchards bend with fruit + That sorrow may be mute; + + A hectic splendor lights thy days to sleep, + Ere the gray dusk may creep + Sober and sad along thy dusty ways, + Like a lone nun, who prays; + + High and faint-heard thy passing migrant calls; + Thy lazy lizard sprawls + On his gray stone, and many slow winds creep + About thy hedge, asleep; + + The sun swings farther toward his love, the south, + To kiss her glowing mouth; + And Death, who steals among thy purpling bowers, + Is deeply hid in flowers. + + Would that thy streams were Lethe, and might flow + Where lotus blossoms blow, + And all the sweets wherewith thy riches bless + Might hold no bitterness! + + Would, in thy beauty, we might all forget + Dead days and old regret, + And through thy realm might fare us forth to roam, + Having no thought for home! + + And yet I feel, beneath thy queen's attire, + Woven of blood and fire, + Beneath the golden glory of thy charm + Thy mother heart beats warm, + + And if, mayhap, a wandering child of thee, + Weary of land and sea, + Should turn him homeward from his dreamer's quest + To sob upon thy breast, + + Thine arm would fold him tenderly, to prove + How thine eyes brimmed with love, + And thy dear hand, with all a mother's care, + Would rest upon his hair. + + + + +The Old Clock + + + + All day low clouds and slanting rain + Have swept the woods and dimmed the plain. + Wet winds have swayed the birch and oak, + And caught and swirled away the smoke, + But, all day long, the wooden clock + Went on, Nic-noc, nic-noc. + + When deep at night I wake with fear, + And shudder in the dark to hear + The roaring storm's unguided strength, + Peace steals into my heart at length, + When, calm amid the shout and shock, + I hear, Nic-noc, nic-noc. + + And all the winter long 't is I + Who bless its sheer monotony-- + Its scorn of days, which cares no whit + For time, except to measure it: + The prosy, dozy, cosy clock, + Nic-noc, nic-noc, nic-noc! + + + + +Tear Stains + + + + Tear-marks stain from page to page + This book my fathers left to me,-- + So dull that nothing but its age + Were worth its freight across the sea. + + But tear stains! When, by whom, and why? + Thus takes my fancy to its wings; + For grief is old, and one may cry + About so many things! + + + + +A Prayer + + + + If many years should dim my inward sight, + Till, stirred with no emotion, + I might stand gazing at the fall of night + Across the gloaming ocean; + + Till storm, and sun, and night, vast with her stars, + Would seem an oft-told story, + And the old sorrow of heroic wars + Be faded of its glory; + + Till, hearing, while June's roses blew their musk, + The noise of field and city, + The human struggle, sinking tired at dusk, + I felt no thrill of pity; + + Till dawn should come without her old desire, + And day brood o'er her stages,-- + O let me die, too frail for nature's hire, + And rest a million ages. + + + + +She Being Young + + + + The home of love is her blue eyes, + Wherein all joy, all beauty lies, + More sweet than hopes of paradise, + She being young. + + Speak of her with a miser's praise; + She craves no golden speech; her ways + Wind through charmed nights and magic days, + She being young. + + She is so far from pain and death, + So warm her cheek, so sweet her breath + Glad words are all the words she saith, + She being young. + + Seeing her face, it seems not far + To Troy's heroic field of war, + To Troy and all great things that are, + She being young. + + + + +Paul Jones + + + + A century of silent suns + Have set since he was laid on sleep, + And now they bear with booming guns + And streaming banners o'er the deep + A withered skin and clammy hair + Upon a frame of human bones: + Whose corse? We neither know nor care, + Content to name it John Paul Jones. + + His dust were as another's dust; + His bones--what boots it where they lie? + What matter where his sword is rust, + Or where, now dark, his eagle eye? + No foe need fear his arm again, + Nor love, nor praise can make him whole; + But o'er the farthest sons of men + Will brood the glory of his soul. + + Careless though cenotaph or tomb + Shall tower his country's monument, + Let banners float and cannon boom, + A million-throated shout be spent, + Until his widowed sea shall laugh + With sunlight in her mantling foam, + While, to his tomb or cenotaph, + We bid our hero welcome home. + + Twice exiled, let his ashes rest + At home, afar, or in the wave, + But keep his great heart with us, lest + Our nation's greatness find its grave; + And, while the vast deep listens by, + When armored wrong makes terms to right, + Keep on our lips his proud reply, + "Sir, I have but begun to fight!" + + + + +The Drudge + + + + Repose upon her soulless face, + Dig the grave and leave her; + But breathe a prayer that, in his grace, + He who so loved this toiling race + To endless rest receive her. + + Oh, can it be the gates ajar + Wait not her humble quest, + Whose life was but a patient war + Against the death that stalked from far + With neither haste nor rest; + + To whom were sun and moon and cloud, + The streamlet's pebbly coil, + The transient, May-bound, feathered crowd, + The storm's frank fury, thunder-browed, + But witness of her toil; + + Whose weary feet knew not the bliss + Of dance by jocund reed; + Who never dallied at a kiss! + If heaven refuses her, life is + A tragedy indeed! + + + + +The Wife + + + + They locked him in a prison cell, + Murky and mean. + She kissed him there a wife's farewell + The bars between. + And when she turned to go, the crowd, + Thinking to see her shamed and bowed, + Saw her pass out as calm and proud + As any queen. + + She passed a kinsman on the street, + To whose sad eyes + She made reply with smile as sweet + As April skies. + To one who loved her once and knew + The sorrow of her life, she threw + A gay word, ere his tale was due + Of sympathies. + + She met a playmate, whose red rose + Had never a thorn, + Whom fortune guided when she chose + Her marriage morn, + And, smiling, looked her in the eye; + But, seeing the tears of sympathy, + Her smile died, and she passed on by + In quiet scorn. + + They could not know how, when by night + The city slept, + A sleepless woman, still and white, + The watches kept; + How her wife-loyal heart had borne + The keen pain of a flowerless thorn, + How hot the tears that smiles and scorn + Had held unwept. + + + + +Vision + + + + The wintry sun was pale + On hill and hedge; + The wind smote with its flail + The seeded sedge; + High up above the world, + New taught to fly, + The withered leaves were hurled + About the sky; + And there, through death and dearth, + It went and came,-- + The Glory of the earth + That hath no name. + + I know not what it is; + I only know + It quivers in the bliss + Where roses blow, + That on the winter's breath + It broods in space, + And o'er the face of death + I see its face, + And start and stand between + Delight and dole, + As though mine eyes had seen + A living Soul. + + And I have followed it, + As thou hast done, + Where April shadows flit + Beneath the sun; + In dawn and dusk and star, + In joy and fear, + Have seen its glory far + And felt it near, + And dared recall his name + Who stood unshod + Before a fireless flame, + And called it God. + + + + +September + + + + I have not been among the woods, + Nor seen the milk-weeds burst their hoods, + + The downy thistle-seeds take wing, + Nor the squirrel at his garnering. + + And yet I know that, up to God, + The mute month holds her goldenrod, + + That clump and copse, o'errun with vines, + Twinkle with clustered muscadines, + + And in deserted churchyard places + Dwarf apples smile with sunburnt faces. + + I know how, ere her green is shed, + The dogwood pranks herself with red; + + How the pale dawn, chilled through and through, + Comes drenched and draggled with her dew; + + How all day long the sunlight seems + As if it lit a land of dreams, + + Till evening, with her mist and cloud, + Begins to weave her royal shroud. + + If yet, as in old Homer's land, + Gods walk with mortals, hand in hand, + + Somewhere to-day, in this sweet weather, + Thinkest thou not they walk together? + + + + +Barefooted + + + + The girls all like to see the bluets in the lane + And the saucy johnny-jump-ups in the meadow, + But, we boys, we want to see the dogwood blooms again, + Throwin' a sort of summer-lookin' shadow; + For the very first mild mornin' when the woods are white + (And we needn't even ask a soul about it) + We leave our shoes right where we pulled them off at night, + And, barefooted once again, we run and shout it: + You may take the country over-- + When the bluebird turns a rover, + And the wind is soft and hazy, + And you feel a little lazy, + And the hunters quit the possums-- + It's the time for dogwood blossoms. + + We feel so light we wish there were more fences here; + We'd like to jump and jump them, all together! + No sleds for us, no guns, nor even 'simmon beer, + No nothin' but the blossoms and fair weather! + The meadow is a little sticky right at first, + But a few short days 'll wipe away that trouble. + To feel so good and gay, I wouldn't mind the worst + That could be done by any field o' stubble. + O, all the trees are seemin' sappy! + O, all the folks are smilin' happy! + And there's joy in every little bit of room; + But the happiest of them all + At the Shanghai rooster's call + Are we barefoots when the dogwoods burst abloom! + + + + +Pardon Time + + + + Give over now; forbear. The moonlight steeps + In silver silence towered castle-keeps + And cottage crofts, where apples bend the bough. + Peace guards us round, and many a tired heart sleeps. + Let me brush back the shadow from your brow. + Give over now. + + On such a night, how sweet, how sweet is life, + Even to the insect piper with his fife! + And must your troubled face still bear the blight + Of strength that runs itself to waste in strife? + For love's own heart should throb through all the light + Of such a night. + + + + +The Rattlesnake + + + + Coiled like a clod, his eyes the home of hate, + Where rich the harvest bows, he lies in wait, + Linking earth's death and music, mate with mate. + + Is 't lure, or warning? Those small bells may sing + Like Ariel sirens, poised on viewless wing, + To lead stark life where mailed death is king; + + Else nature's voice, in that cold, earthy thrill, + Bids good avoid the venomed fang of ill, + And life and death fight equal in her will. + + + + +The Prisoner + + + + From pacing, pacing without hope or quest + He leaned against his window-bars to rest + And smelt the breeze that crept up from the west. + + It came with sundown noises from the moors, + Of milking time and loud-voiced rural chores, + Of lumbering wagons and of closing doors. + + He caught a whiff of furrowed upland sweet, + And certain scents stole up across the street + That told him fireflies winked among the wheat. + + Over the dusk hill woke a new moon's light, + Shadowed the woods and made the waters white, + And watched above the quiet tents of night. + + Alas, that the old Mother should not know + How ached his heart to be entreated so, + Who heard her calling and who could not go! + + + + +Sonnet + + + + To-day was but a dead day in my hands. + Hour by hour did nothing more than pass, + Mere idle winds above the faded grass. + And I, as though a captive held in bands, + Who, seeing a pageant, wonders much, but stands + Apart, saw the sun blaze his course with brass + And sink into his fabled sea of glass + With glory of farewell to many lands. + + Thou knowest, thou who talliest life by days, + That I have suffered more than pain of toil, + Ah, more than they whose wounds are soothed with oil, + And they who see new light on beaten ways! + The prisoner I, who grasps his iron bars + And stares out into depth on depth of stars! + + + + +Folk Song + + + + When merry milkmaids to their cattle call + At evenfall + And voices range + Loud through the gloam from grange to quiet grange, + + Wild waif-songs from long distant lands and loves, + Like migrant doves, + Wake and give wing + To passion dust-dumb lips were wont to sing. + + The new still holds the old moon in her arms; + The ancient charms + Of dew and dusk + Still lure her nomad odors from the musk, + + And, at each day's millennial eclipse, + On new men's lips, + Some old song starts, + Made of the music of millennial hearts, + + Whereto one listens as from long ago + And learns to know + That one day's tears + And love and life are as a thousand years', + + And that some simple shepherd, singing of + His pain and love, + May haply find + His heart-song speaks the heart of all his kind. + + + + +"97": The Fast Mail + + + + Where the rails converge to the station yard + She stands one moment, breathing hard, + + And then, with a snort and a clang of steel, + She settles her strength to the stubborn wheel, + + And out, through the tracks that lead astray, + Cautiously, slowly she picks her way, + + And gathers her muscle and guards her nerve, + When she swings her nose to the westward curve, + + And takes the grade, which slopes to the sky, + With a bound of speed and a conquering cry. + + The hazy horizon is all she sees, + Nor cares for the meadows, stirred with bees, + + Nor the long, straight stretches of silent land, + Nor the ploughman, that shades his eye with his hand, + + Nor the cots and hamlets that know no more + Than a shriek and a flash and a flying roar; + + But, bearing her tidings, she trembles and throbs, + And laughs in her throat, and quivers and sobs; + + And the fire in her heart is a red core of heat, + That drives like a passion through forest and street, + + Till she sees the ships in their harbor at rest, + And sniffs at the trail to the end of her quest. + + If I were the driver who handles her reins, + Up hill and down hill and over the plains, + + To watch the slow mountains give back in the west, + To know the new reaches that wait every crest, + + To hold, when she swerves, with a confident clutch, + And feel how she shivers and springs to the touch, + + With the snow on her back and the sun in her face, + And nothing but time as a quarry to chase, + + I should grip hard my teeth, and look where she led, + And brace myself stooping, and give her her head, + + And urge her, and soothe her, and serve all her need, + And exult in the thunder and thrill of her speed. + + + + +Sundown + + + + Hills, wrapped in gray, standing along the west; + Clouds, dimly lighted, gathering slowly; + The star of peace at watch above the crest-- + Oh, holy, holy, holy! + + We know, O Lord, so little what is best; + Wingless, we move so lowly; + But in thy calm all-knowledge let us rest-- + Oh, holy, holy, holy! + + + + +At Sea + + + + When the dim, tall sails of the ships were in motion, + Ghostly, and slow, and silent-shod, + We gazed where the dusk fled over the ocean, + A great gray hush, like the shadow of God. + + The sky dome cut with its compass in sunder + A circle of sea from the darkened land,-- + A circle of tremulous waste and wonder, + O'er which one groped with a childish hand. + + The true stars came to their stations in heaven, + The false stars shivered deep down in the sea, + And the white crests went like monsters, driven + By winds that never would let them be, + + And there, where the elements mingled and muttered, + We stood, each man with a lone dumb heart, + Full of the vastness that never was uttered + By symbol of words or by echo of art. + + + + +L'envoi + + + + God willed, who never needed speech, + "Let all things be:" + And, lo, the starry firmament + And land and sea + And his first thought of life that lives + In you and me. + + His circle of eternity + We see in part; + Our spirits are his breath, our hearts + Beat from his heart; + Hence we have played as little gods + And called it art. + + Lacking his power, we shared his dream + Of perfect things; + Between the tents of hope and sweet + Rememberings + Have sat in ashes, but our souls + Went forth on wings. + + Where life fell short of some desire + In you and me, + Feeling for beauty which our eyes + Could never see, + Behold, from out the void we willed + That it should be, + + And sometimes dreamed our lisping songs + Of humanhood + Might voice his silent harmony + Of waste and wood, + And he, beholding his and ours, + Might find it good. + + + + +[End of original text.] + + + + + +Notes: + + +John Charles McNeill was born in Scotland County, near Laurinburg, North +Carolina, on 26 July 1874, and died on 17 October 1907 (when he was 33 +years old). He only produced this one volume before he died, though he +planned a second, which was published posthumously. "Songs, Merry and +Sad", first published in Charlotte in 1906, went through at least five +printings over more than 60 years. (This text is taken from the very +first edition.) + +Both of McNeill's grandfathers came from Scotland. + +McNeill attended Wake Forest College, where he received both his +Bachelor's and Master's degrees. In 1899-1900 he taught English at +Mercer University. + +Some of his poems were published nationally as early as 1901. More of +his poems were published by `The Charlotte Observer' starting in 1903, +and in 1904 he joined its staff. + + +This etext was created by entering the text (manually) twice, once from +the first printing (1906) and once from the second printing (no date), +and comparing the two. There were some slight differences in the two +printings. + +A portrait of John Charles McNeill faces the title page (p. 3) in the +second printing, but is absent in the first. + +The first printing gives the publisher as Stone & Barringer Co. and +gives the date as 1906. The second printing gives the publisher as +Stone Publishing Co., and gives no date. Both were printed in +Charlotte, N.C. + +One error was corrected (the second printing also corrected this error): + + (p. 73) + [ A holy presence hovers round here there, ] + changed to: + [ A holy presence hovers round her there, ] + + +The second printing also changed the title of the poem [ To Melvin +Gardner: Suicide ], on p. 19, to [ To Melvin Gardner: ]--in the text, +but not in the table of Contents. This may have been done in deference +to the family--attitudes on suicide were once quite different than +now--but as it has been quite some time, and the original title gives +more meaning to the poem, it has been retained. + +The Title of the poem [ Now! ] did not have the exclamation point in the +table of Contents. It has been added to match the text. The Title of +the poem [ "97": The Fast Mail ] appeared as such in the text, but as +["97:" The Fast Mail ] in the Contents. The latter was changed to match +the text. + +In the original, the book's title does not separate the Contents from +the first poem. It has been placed there as a sort of divider. + +In two places ASCII fails to provide enough characters for a correct +rendering. They are the words Provencal (the c with a cedilla) and +mailed (the e with an acute accent, to indicate that the word is to be +said with two syllables). These occur in "Reminiscence" and "The +Rattlesnake". + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Songs, Merry and Sad, by John Charles McNeill + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SONGS, MERRY AND SAD *** + +***** This file should be named 1847.txt or 1847.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/4/1847/ + +Produced by Alan R. Light + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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To assure a high quality text, +the original was typed in (manually) twice and electronically compared. + + + + + +Songs, Merry and Sad + +by John Charles McNeill + + +[American (North Carolina) poet. 1874-1907.] + + + +To +JOSEPH P. CALDWELL +("The Old Man") + + + + +Contents + + + +The Bride +"Oh, Ask Me Not" +Isabel +To ------ +To Melvin Gardner: Suicide +Away Down Home +For Jane's Birthday +A Secret +The Old Bad Woman +Valentine +A Photograph +Jesse Covington +An Idyl +Home Songs +M. W. Ransom +Protest +Oblivion +Now! +Tommy Smith +Before Bedtime +"If I Could Glimpse Him" +Attraction +Love's Fashion +Alcestis +Reminiscence +Sonnet +Lines +An Easter Hymn +A Christmas Hymn +When I Go Home +Odessa +Trifles +Sunburnt Boys +Gray Days +An Invalid +A Caged Mocking-Bird +Dawn +Harvest +Two Pictures +October +The Old Clock +Tear Stains +A Prayer +She Being Young +Paul Jones +The Drudge +The Wife +Vision +September +Barefooted +Pardon Time +The Rattlesnake +The Prisoner +Sonnet +Folk Song +"97": The Fast Mail +Sundown +At Sea +L'envoi + + + + +Songs, Merry and Sad + + + + +The Bride + + + +The little white bride is left alone +With him, her lord; the guests have gone; + The festal hall is dim. +No jesting now, nor answering mirth. +The hush of sleep falls on the earth + And leaves her here with him. + +Why should there be, O little white bride, +When the world has left you by his side, + A tear to brim your eyes? +Some old love-face that comes again, +Some old love-moment sweet with pain + Of passionate memories? + +Does your heart yearn back with last regret +For the maiden meads of mignonette + And the fairy-haunted wood, +That you had not withheld from love, +A little while, the freedom of + Your happy maidenhood? + +Or is it but a nameless fear, +A wordless joy, that calls the tear + In dumb appeal to rise, +When, looking on him where he stands, +You yield up all into his hands, + Pleading into his eyes? + +For days that laugh or nights that weep +You two strike oars across the deep + With life's tide at the brim; +And all time's beauty, all love's grace +Beams, little bride, upon your face + Here, looking up at him. + + + + +"Oh, Ask Me Not" + + + +Love, should I set my heart upon a crown, + Squander my years, and gain it, +What recompense of pleasure could I own? + For youth's red drops would stain it. + +Much have I thought on what our lives may mean, + And what their best endeavor, +Seeing we may not come again to glean, + But, losing, lose forever. + +Seeing how zealots, making choice of pain, + From home and country parted, +Have thought it life to leave their fellows slain, + Their women broken-hearted; + +How teasing truth a thousand faces claims, + As in a broken mirror, +And what a father died for in the flames + His own son scorns as error; + +How even they whose hearts were sweet with song + Must quaff oblivion's potion, +And, soon or late, their sails be lost along + The all-surrounding ocean: + +Oh, ask me not the haven of our ships, + Nor what flag floats above you! +I hold you close, I kiss your sweet, sweet lips, + And love you, love you, love you! + + + + +Isabel + + + +When first I stood before you, + Isabel, +I stood there to adore you, + In your spell; +For all that grace composes, +And all that beauty knows is +Your face above the roses, + Isabel. + +You knew the charm of flowers, + Isabel, +Which, like incarnate hours, + Rose and fell +At your bosom, glowed and gloried, +White and pale and pink and florid, +And you touched them with your forehead, + Isabel. + +Amid the jest and laughter, + Isabel, +I saw you, and thereafter, + Ill or well, +There was nothing else worth seeing, +Worth following or fleeing, +And no reason else for being, + Isabel. + + + + +To ------ + + + +Some time, far hence, when Autumn sheds + Her frost upon your hair, +And you together sit at dusk, + May I come to you there? +And lightly will our hearts turn back + To this, then distant, day +When, while the world was clad in flowers, + You two were wed in May. + +When we shall sit about your board + Three old friends met again, +Joy will be with us, but not much + Of jest and laughter then; +For Autumn's large content and calm, + Like heaven's own smile, will bless +The harvest of your happy lives + With store of happiness. + +May you, who, flankt about with flowers, + Will plight your faith to-day, +Hold, evermore enthroned, the love + Which you have crowned in May; +And Time will sleep upon his scythe, + The swallow rest his wing, +Seeing that you at autumntide + Still clasp the hands of spring. + + + + +To Melvin Gardner: Suicide + + + +A flight of doves, with wanton wings, + Flash white against the sky. +In the leafy copse an oriole sings, + And a robin sings hard by. +Sun and shadow are out on the hills; +The swallow has followed the daffodils; +In leaf and blade, life throbs and thrills + Through the wild, warm heart of May. + +To have seen the sun come back, to have seen + Children again at play, +To have heard the thrush where the woods are green + Welcome the new-born day, +To have felt the soft grass cool to the feet, +To have smelt earth's incense, heavenly sweet, +To have shared the laughter along the street, + And, then, to have died in May! + +A thousand roses will blossom red, + A thousand hearts be gay, +For the summer lingers just ahead + And June is on her way; +The bee must bestir him to fill his cells, +The moon and the stars will weave new spells +Of love and the music of marriage bells -- + And, oh, to be dead in May! + + + + +Away Down Home + + + +'T will not be long before they hear + The bullbat on the hill, +And in the valley through the dusk + The pastoral whippoorwill. +A few more friendly suns will call + The bluets through the loam +And star the lanes with buttercups + Away down home. + +"Knee-deep!" from reedy places + Will sing the river frogs. +The terrapins will sun themselves + On all the jutting logs. +The angler's cautious oar will leave + A trail of drifting foam +Along the shady currents + Away down home. + +The mocking-bird will feel again + The glory of his wings, +And wanton through the balmy air + And sunshine while he sings, +With a new cadence in his call, + The glint-wing'd crow will roam +From field to newly-furrowed field + Away down home. + +When dogwood blossoms mingle + With the maple's modest red, +And sweet arbutus wakes at last + From out her winter's bed, +'T would not seem strange at all to meet + A dryad or a gnome, +Or Pan or Psyche in the woods + Away down home. + +Then come with me, thou weary heart! + Forget thy brooding ills, +Since God has come to walk among + His valleys and his hills! +The mart will never miss thee, + Nor the scholar's dusty tome, +And the Mother waits to bless thee, + Away down home. + + + + +For Jane's Birthday + + + +If fate had held a careless knife + And clipped one line that drew, +Of all the myriad lines of life, + From Eden up to you; +If, in the wars and wastes of time, + One sire had met the sword, +One mother died before her prime + Or wed some other lord; + +Or had some other age been blest, + Long past or yet to be, +And you had been the world's sweet guest + Before or after me: +I wonder how this rose would seem, + Or yonder hillside cot; +For, dear, I cannot even dream + A world where you are not! + +Thus heaven forfends that I shall drink + The gall that might have been, +If aught had broken a single link + Along the lists of men; +And heaven forgives me, whom it loves, + For feigning such distress: +My heart is happiest when it proves + Its depth of happiness. + +Enough to see you where you are, + Radiant with maiden mirth! +To bless whatever blessed star + Presided o'er your birth, +That, on this immemorial morn, + When heaven was bending low, +The gods were kind and you were born + Twenty sweet years ago! + + + + +A Secret + + + +A little baby went to sleep + One night in his white bed, +And the moon came by to take a peep + At the little baby head. + +A wind, as wandering winds will do, + Brought to the baby there +Sweet smells from some quaint flower that grew + Out on some hill somewhere. + +And wind and flower and pale moonbeam + About the baby's bed +Stirred and woke the funniest dream + In the little sleepy head. + +He thought he was all sorts of things + From a lion to a cat; +Sometimes he thought he flew on wings, + Or fell and fell, so that + +When morning broke he was right glad + But much surprised to see +Himself a soft, pink little lad + Just like he used to be. + +I would not give this story fame + If there were room to doubt it, +But when he learned to talk, he came + And told me all about it. + + + + +The Old Bad Woman + + + +The Old Bad Woman was coming along, +Busily humming a sort of song. + +You could barely see, below her bonnet, +Her chin where her long nose rested on it. + +One tooth thrust out on her lower lip, +And she held one hand upon her hip. + +Then we went to thinking mighty fast, +For we knew our time had come at last. + +For what we had done and didn't do +The Old Bad Woman would put us through. + +If you cried enough to fill your hat, +She wouldn't care; she was used to that. + +Of the jam we had eaten, she would know; +How we ran barefooted in the snow; + +How we cried when they made us take our bath; +How we tied the grass across the path; + +How we bound together the cat and cur -- +We couldn't deny these things to her. + +She pulled her nose up off her chin +And blinked at us with an awful grin. + +And we almost died, becaze and because +Her bony fingers looked like claws. + +When she came on up to where we were, +How could we be polite to her? + +You needn't guess how she put us through. +If you are bad, she'll visit you. + +And when she leaves and hobbles off +You'll think that she has done enough; + +For the Old Bad Woman will and can +Be just as bad as the Old Bad Man! + + + + +Valentine + + + +This is the time for birds to mate; + To-day the dove +Will mark the ancient amorous date + With moans of love; +The crow will change his call to prate + His hopes thereof. + +The starling will display the red + That lights his wings; +The wren will know the sweet things said + By him who swings +And ducks and dips his crested head + And sings and sings. + +They are obedient to their blood, + Nor ask a sign, +Save buoyant air and swelling bud, + At hands divine, +But choose, each in the barren wood, + His valentine. + +In caution's maze they never wait + Until they die; +They flock the season's open gate + Ere time steals by. +Love, shall we see and imitate, + You, love, and I? + + + + +A Photograph + + + +When in this room I turn in pondering pace +And find thine eyes upon me where I stand, +Led on, as by Enemo's silken strand, +I come and gaze and gaze upon thy face. + +Framed round by silence, poised on pearl-white grace +Of curving throat, too sweet for beaded band, +It seems as if some wizard's magic wand +Had wrought thee for the love of all the race. + +Dear face, that will not turn about to see +The tulips, glorying in the casement sun, +Or, other days, the drizzled raindrops run + +Down the damp walls, but follow only me, +Would that Pygmalion's goddess might be won +To change this lifeless image into thee! + + + + +Jesse Covington + + + +If I have had some merry times + In roaming up and down the earth, +Have made some happy-hearted rhymes + And had my brimming share of mirth, +And if this song should live in fame + When my brief day is dead and gone, +Let it recall with mine the name + Of old man Jesse Covington. + +Let it recall his waggish heart -- + Yeke-hey, yeke-hey, hey-diddle-diddle -- +When, while the fire-logs fell apart, + He snatched the bow across his fiddle, +And looked on, with his eyes half shut, + Which meant his soul was wild with fun, +At our mad capers through the hut + Of old man Jesse Covington. + +For all the thrilling tales he told, + For all the tunes the fiddle knew, +For all the glorious nights of old + We boys and he have rollicked through, +For laughter all unknown to wealth + That roared responsive to a pun, +A hale, ripe age and ruddy health + To old man Jesse Covington! + + + + +An Idyl + + + +Upon a gnarly, knotty limb + That fought the current's crest, +Where shocks of reeds peeped o'er the brim, + Wild wasps had glued their nest. + +And in a sprawling cypress' grot, + Sheltered and safe from flood, +Dirt-daubers each had chosen a spot + To shape his house of mud. + +In a warm crevice of the bark + A basking scorpion clung, +With bright blue tail and red-rimmed eyes + And yellow, twinkling tongue. + +A lunging trout flashed in the sun, + To do some petty slaughter, +And set the spiders all a-run + On little stilts of water. + +Toward noon upon the swamp there stole + A deep, cathedral hush, +Save where, from sun-splocht bough and bole, + Sweet thrush replied to thrush. + +An angler came to cast his fly + Beneath a baffling tree. +I smiled, when I had caught his eye, + And he smiled back at me. + +When stretched beside a shady elm + I watched the dozy heat, +Nature was moving in her realm, + For I could hear her feet. + + + + +Home Songs + + + +The little loves and sorrows are my song: + The leafy lanes and birthsteads of my sires, + Where memory broods by winter's evening fires +O'er oft-told joys, and ghosts of ancient wrong; +The little cares and carols that belong + To home-hearts, and old rustic lutes and lyres, + And spreading acres, where calm-eyed desires +Wake with the dawn, unfevered, fair, and strong. + +If words of mine might lull the bairn to sleep, + And tell the meaning in a mother's eyes; +Might counsel love, and teach their eyes to weep + Who, o'er their dead, question unanswering skies, +More worth than legions in the dust of strife, +Time, looking back at last, should count my life. + + + + +M. W. Ransom + + (Died October 8, 1904) + + + +For him, who in a hundred battles stood + Scorning the cannon's mouth, +Grimy with flame and red with foeman's blood, + For thy sweet sake, O South; + +Who, wise as brave, yielded his conquered sword + At a vain war's surcease, +And spoke, thy champion still, the statesman's word + In the calm halls of peace; + +Who pressed the ruddy wine to thy faint lips, + Where thy torn body lay, +And saw afar time's white in-sailing ships + Bringing a happier day: + +Oh, mourn for him, dear land that gave him birth! + Bow low thy sorrowing head! +Let thy seared leaves fall silent on the earth + Whereunder he lies dead! + +In field and hall, in valor and in grace, + In wisdom's livery, +Gentle and brave, he moved with knightly pace, + A worthy son of thee! + + + + +Protest + + + +Oh, I am weary, weary, weary + Of Pan and oaten quills +And little songs that, from the dictionary, + Learn lore of streams and hills, +Of studied laughter, mocking what is merry, + And calculated thrills! + +Are we grown old and past the time of singing? + Is ardor quenched in art +Till art is but a formal figure, bringing + A money-measured heart, +Procrustean cut, and, with old echoes, ringing + Its bells about the mart? + +The race moves on, and leaves no wildernesses + Where rugged voices cry; +It reads its prayer, and with set phrase it blesses + The souls of men who die, +And step by even step its rank progresses, + An army marshalled by. + +If it be better so, that Babel noises, + Losing all course and ken, +And grief that wails and gladness that rejoices + Should never wake again +To shock a world of modulated voices + And mediocre men, + +Then he is blest who wears the painted feather + And may not turn about +To dusks when muses romped the dewy heather + In unrestricted rout +And dawns when, if the stars had sung together, + The sons of God would shout! + + + + +Oblivion + + + +Green moss will creep +Along the shady graves where we shall sleep. + +Each year will bring +Another brood of birds to nest and sing. + +At dawn will go +New ploughmen to the fields we used to know. + +Night will call home +The hunter from the hills we loved to roam. + +She will not ask, +The milkmaid, singing softly at her task, + +Nor will she care +To know if I were brave or you were fair. + +No one will think +What chalice life had offered us to drink, + +When from our clay +The sun comes back to kiss the snow away. + + + + +Now! + + + +Her brown hair knew no royal crest, + No gems nor jeweled charms, +No roses her bright cheek caressed, + No lilies kissed her arms. +In simple, modest womanhood + Clad, as was meet, in white, +The fairest flower of all, she stood + Amid the softest light. + +It had been worth a perilous quest + To see the court she drew, -- +My rose, my gem, my royal crest, + My lily moist with dew; +Worth heaven, when, with farewells from each + The gay throng let us be, +To see her turn at last and reach + Her white hands out to me. + + + + +Tommy Smith + + + +When summer's languor drugs my veins + And fills with sleep the droning times, +Like sluggish dreams among my brains, + There runs the drollest sort of rhymes, +Idle as clouds that stray through heaven + And vague as if they were a myth, +But in these rhymes is always given + A health for old Bluebritches Smith. + +Among my thoughts of what is good + In olden times and distant lands, +Is that do-nothing neighborhood + Where the old cider-hogshead stands +To welcome with its brimming gourd + The canny crowd of kin and kith +Who meet about the bibulous board + Of old Bluebritches Tommy Smith. + +In years to come, when stealthy change + Hath stolen the cider-press away +And the gnarled orchards of the grange + Have fallen before a slow decay, +Were I so cunning, I would carve + From some time-scorning monolith +A sculpture that should well preserve + The fame of old Bluebritches Smith. + + + + +Before Bedtime + + + +The cat sleeps in a chimney jam + With ashes in her fur, +An' Tige, from on the yuther side, + He keeps his eye on her. + +The jar o' curds is on the hearth, + An' I'm the one to turn it. +I'll crawl in bed an' go to sleep + When maw begins to churn it. + +Paw bends to read his almanax + An' study out the weather, +An' bud has got a gourd o' grease + To ile his harness leather. + +Sis looks an' looks into the fire, + Half-squintin' through her lashes, +An' I jis watch my tater where + It shoots smoke through the ashes. + + + + +"If I Could Glimpse Him" + + + +When in the Scorpion circles low + The sun with fainter, dreamier light, +And at a far-off hint of snow + The giddy swallows take to flight, +And droning insects sadly know + That cooler falls the autumn night; + +When airs breathe drowsily and sweet, + Charming the woods to colors gay, +And distant pastures send the bleat + Of hungry lambs at break of day, +Old Hermes' wings grow on my feet, + And, good-by, home! I'm called away! + +There on the hills should I behold, + Sitting upon an old gray stone +That humps its back up through the mold, + And piping in a monotone, +Pan, as he sat in days of old, + My joy would bid surprise begone! + +Dear Pan! 'Tis he that calls me out; + He, lying in some hazel copse, +Where lazily he turns about + And munches each nut as it drops, +Well pleased to see me swamped in doubt + At sound of his much-changing stops. + +If I could glimpse him by the vine + Where purple fox-grapes hang their store, +I'd tell him, in his leafy shrine, + How poets say he lives no more. +He'd laugh, and pluck a muscadine, + And fall to piping, as of yore! + + + + +Attraction + + + +He who wills life wills its condition sweet, +Having made love its mother, joy its quest, +That its perpetual sequence might not rest +On reason's dictum, cold and too discreet; + +For reason moves with cautious, careful feet, +Debating whether life or death were best, +And why pale pain, not ruddy mirth, is guest +In many a heart which life hath set to beat. + +But I will cast my fate with love, and trust +Her honeyed heart that guides the pollened bee +And sets the happy wing-seeds fluttering free; + +And I will bless the law which saith, Thou must! +And, wet with sea or shod with weary dust, +Will follow back and back and back to thee! + + + + +Love's Fashion + + + +Oh, I can jest with Margaret + And laugh a gay good-night, +But when I take my Helen's hand + I dare not clasp it tight. + +I dare not hold her dear white hand + More than a quivering space, +And I should bless a breeze that blew + Her hair into my face. + +'T is Margaret I call sweet names: + Helen is too, too dear +For me to stammer little words + Of love into her ear. + +So now, good-night, fair Margaret, + And kiss me e'er we part! +But one dumb touch of Helen's hand, + And, oh, my heart, my heart! + + + + +Alcestis + + + +Not long the living weep above their dead, +And you will grieve, Admetus, but not long. +The winter's silence in these desolate halls +Will break with April's laughter on your lips; +The bees among the flowers, the birds that mate, +The widowed year, grown gaunt with memory +And yearning toward the summer's fruits, will come +With lotus comfort, feeding all your veins. +The vining brier will crawl across my grave, +And you will woo another in my stead. +Those tender, foolish names you called me by, +Your passionate kiss that clung unsatisfied, +The pressure of your hand, when dark night hushed +Life's busy stir, and left us two alone, +Will you remember? or, when dawn creeps in, +And you bend o'er another's pillowed head, +Seeing sleep's loosened hair about her face, +Until her low love-laughter welcomes you, +Will you, down-gazing at her waking eyes, +Forget? + So have I loved you, my Admetus, +I thank the cruel fates who clip my life +To lengthen yours, they tarry not for age +To dim my eye and blanch my cheek, but now +Take me, while my lips are sweet to you +And youth hides yet amid this hair of mine, +Brown in the shadow, golden in the light. +Bend down and kiss me, dying for your sake, +Not gratefully, but sadly, love's farewell; +And if the flowering year's oblivion +Lend a new passion to thy life, far down +In the dim Stygian shadows wandering, +I will not know, but still will cherish there, +Where no change comes, thy love upon my lips. + + + + +Reminiscence + + + +We sang old love-songs on the way + In sad and merry snatches, +Your fingers o'er the strings astray + Strumming the random catches. + +And ever, as the skiff plied on + Among the trailing willows, +Trekking the darker deeps to shun + The gleaming sandy shallows, + +It seemed that we had, ages gone, + In some far summer weather, +When this same faery moonlight shone, + Sung these same songs together. + +And every grassy cape we passed, + And every reedy island, +Even the bank'd cloud in the west + That loomed a sombre highland; + +And you, with dewmist on your hair, + Crowned with a wreath of lilies, +Laughing like Lalage the fair + And tender-eyed like Phyllis: + +I know not if 't were here at home, + By some old wizard's orders, +Or long ago in Crete or Rome + Or fair Provencal borders, + +But now, as when a faint flame breaks + From out its smouldering embers, +My heart stirs in its sleep, and wakes, + And yet but half-remembers + +That you and I some other time + Moved through this dream of glory, +Like lovers in an ancient rhyme, + A long-forgotten story. + + + + +Sonnet + + + +I would that love were subject unto law! + Upon his person I should lay distraint + And force him thus to answer my complaint, +Which I, in well-considered counts, should draw. +Not free to fly, he needs must seek some flaw + To mar my pleading, though his heart were faint; + Declare his counsel to me, and acquaint +Himself with maxim, precedent, and saw. + +Ah, I could win him with authorities, + If suing thus in such a sober court; + Could read him many an ancient rhym'd report +Of such sad cases, tears would fill his eyes + And he confess a judgment, or resort +To some well-pleasing terms of compromise! + + + + +Lines + + + +To you, dear mother heart, whose hair is gray +Above this page to-day, +Whose face, though lined with many a smile and care, +Grows year by year more fair, + +Be tenderest tribute set in perfect rhyme, +That haply passing time +May cull and keep it for strange lips to pay +When we have gone our way; + +And, to strange men, weary of field and street, +Should this, my song, seem sweet, +Yours be the joy, for all that made it so +You know, dear heart, you know. + + + + +An Easter Hymn + + + +The Sun has come again and fed + The lily's lamp with light, +And raised from dust a rose, rich red, + And a little star-flower, white; +He also guards the Pleiades + And holds his planets true: +But we -- we know not which of these + The easier task to do. + +But, since from heaven he stoops to breathe + A flower to balmy air, +Surely our lives are not beneath + The kindness of his care; +And, as he guides the blade that gropes + Up from the barren sod, +So, from the ashes of our hopes, + Will beauty grow toward God. + +Whate'er thy name, O Soul of Life, -- + We know but that thou art, -- +Thou seest, through all our waste of strife, + One groping human heart, +Weary of words and broken sight, + But moved with deep accord +To worship where thy lilies light + The altar of its Lord. + + + + +A Christmas Hymn + + + +Near where the shepherds watched by night + And heard the angels o'er them, +The wise men saw the starry light + Stand still at last before them. +No armored castle there to ward + His precious life from danger, +But, wrapped in common cloth, our Lord + Lay in a lowly manger. +No booming bells proclaimed his birth, + No armies marshalled by, +No iron thunders shook the earth, + No rockets clomb the sky; +The temples builded in his name + Were shapeless granite then, +And all the choirs that sang his fame + Were later breeds of men. +But, while the world about him slept, + Nor cared that he was born, +One gentle face above him kept + Its mother watch till morn; +And, if his baby eyes could tell + What grace and glory were, +No roar of gun, no boom of bell + Were worth the look of her. +Now praise to God that ere his grace + Was scorned and he reviled +He looked into his mother's face, + A little helpless child; +And praise to God that ere men strove + About his tomb in war +One loved him with a mother's love, + Nor knew a creed therefor. + + + + +When I Go Home + + + +When I go home, green, green will glow the grass, +Whereon the flight of sun and cloud will pass; + Long lines of wood-ducks through the deepening gloam +Will hold above the west, as wrought on brass, + And fragrant furrows will have delved the loam, + When I go home. + +When I go home, the dogwood stars will dash +The solemn woods above the bearded ash, + The yellow-jasmine, whence its vine hath clomb, +Will blaze the valleys with its golden flash, + And every orchard flaunt its polychrome, + When I go home. + +When I go home and stroll about the farm, +The thicket and the barnyard will be warm. + Jess will be there, and Nigger Bill, and Tom -- +On whom time's chisel works no hint of harm -- + And, oh, 'twill be a day to rest and roam, + When I go home! + + + + +Odessa + + + +A horror of great darkness over them, +No cloud of fire to guide and cover them, +Beasts for the shambles, tremulous with dread, +They crouch on alien soil among their dead. + +"Thy shield and thy exceeding great reward," +This was thine ancient covenant, O Lord, +Which, sealed with mirth, these many thousand years +Is black with blood and blotted out with tears. + +Have these not toiled through Egypt's burning sun, +And wept beside the streams of Babylon, +Led from thy wilderness of hill and glen +Into a wider wilderness of men? + +Life bore them ever less of gain than loss, +Before and since Golgotha's piteous Cross, +And surely, now, their sorrow hath sufficed +For all the hate that grew from love of Christ! + +Thou great God-heart, heed thou thy people's cry, +Bare-browed and empty-handed where they die, +Sea-sundered from wall-girt Jerusalem, +There being no sword that wills to succor them, -- + +And Miriam's song, long hushed, will rise to thee, +And all thy people lift their eyes to thee, +When, for the darkness' horror over them, +Thou comest, a cloud of light to cover them. + + + + +Trifles + + + +What shall I bring you, sweet? + A posy prankt with every April hue: + The cloud-white daisy, violet sky-blue, + Shot with the primrose sunshine through and through? + +Or shall I bring you, sweet, + Some ancient rhyme of lovers sore beset, + Whose joy is dead, whose sadness lingers yet, + That you may read, and sigh, and soon forget? + +What shall I bring you, sweet? + Was ever trifle yet so held amiss + As not to fill love's waiting heart with bliss, + And merit dalliance at a long, long kiss? + + + + +Sunburnt Boys + + + +Down on the Lumbee river + Where the eddies ripple cool +Your boat, I know, glides stealthily + About some shady pool. +The summer's heats have lulled asleep + The fish-hawk's chattering noise, +And all the swamp lies hushed about + You sunburnt boys. + +You see the minnow's waves that rock + The cradled lily leaves. +From a far field some farmer's song, + Singing among his sheaves, +Comes mellow to you where you sit, + Each man with boatman's poise, +There, in the shimmering water lights, + You sunburnt boys. + +I know your haunts: each gnarly bole + That guards the waterside, +Each tuft of flags and rushes where + The river reptiles hide, +Each dimpling nook wherein the bass + His eager life employs +Until he dies -- the captive of + You sunburnt boys. + +You will not -- will you? -- soon forget + When I was one of you, +Nor love me less that time has borne + My craft to currents new; +Nor shall I ever cease to share + Your hardships and your joys, +Robust, rough-spoken, gentle-hearted + Sunburnt boys! + + + + +Gray Days + + + +A soaking sedge, +A faded field, a leafless hill and hedge, + +Low clouds and rain, +And loneliness and languor worse than pain. + +Mottled with moss, +Each gravestone holds to heaven a patient Cross. + +Shrill streaks of light +Two sycamores' clean-limbed, funereal white, + +And low between, +The sombre cedar and the ivy green. + +Upon the stone +Of each in turn who called this land his own + +The gray rain beats +And wraps the wet world in its flying sheets, + +And at my eaves +A slow wind, ghostlike, comes and grieves and grieves. + + + + +An Invalid + + + +I care not what his name for God may be, + Nor what his wisdom holds of heaven and hell, + The alphabet whereby he strives to spell +His lines of life, nor where he bends his knee, +Since, with his grave before him, he can see + White Peace above it, while the churchyard bell + Poised in its tower, poised now, to boom his knell, +Seems but the waiting tongue of liberty. + +For names and knowledge, idle breed of breath, + And cant and creed, the progeny of strife, + Thronging the safe, companioned streets of life, +Shrink trembling from the cold, clear eye of death, + And learn too late why dying lips can smile: + That goodness is the only creed worth while. + + + + +A Caged Mocking-Bird + + + +I pass a cobbler's shop along the street + And pause a moment at the door-step, where, +In nature's medley, piping cool and sweet, + The songs that thrill the swamps when spring is near, + Fly o'er the fields at fullness of the year, +And twitter where the autumn hedges run, +Join all the months of music into one. + +I shut my eyes: the shy wood-thrush is there, + And all the leaves hang still to catch his spell; +Wrens cheep among the bushes; from somewhere + A bluebird's tweedle passes o'er the fell; + From rustling corn bob-white his name doth tell; +And when the oriole sets his full heart free +Barefooted boyhood comes again to me. + +The vision-bringer hangs upon a nail + Before a dusty window, looking dim +On marts where trade goes hot with box and bale; + The sad-eyed passers have no time for him. + His captor sits, with beaded face and grim, +Plying a listless awl, as in a dream +Of pastures winding by a shady stream. + +Gray bird, what spirit bides with thee unseen? + For now, when every songster finds his love +And makes his nest where woods are deep and green, + Free as the winds, thy song should mock the dove. + If I were thou, my grief in moans should move +At thinking -- otherwhere, by others' art +Charmed and forgetful -- of mine own sweetheart. + +But I, who weep when fortune seems unkind + To prison me within a space of walls, +When far-off grottoes hold my loves enshrined + And every love is cruel when it calls; + Who sulk for hills and fern-fledged waterfalls, -- +I blush to offer sorrow unto thee, +Master of fate, scorner of destiny! + + + + +Dawn + + + +The hills again reach skyward with a smile. + Again, with waking life along its way, +The landscape marches westward mile on mile + And time throbs white into another day. + +Though eager life must wait on livelihood, + And all our hopes be tethered to the mart, +Lacking the eagle's wild, high freedom, would + That ours might be this day the eagle's heart! + + + + +Harvest + + + +Cows in the stall and sheep in the fold; +Clouds in the west, deep crimson and gold; + A heron's far flight to a roost somewhere; + The twitter of killdees keen in the air; +The noise of a wagon that jolts through the gloam + On the last load home. + +There are lights in the windows; a blue spire of smoke +Climbs from the grange grove of elm and oak. + The smell of the Earth, where the night pours to her + Its dewy libation, is sweeter than myrrh, +And an incense to Toil is the smell of the loam + On the last load home. + + + + +Two Pictures + + + +One sits in soft light, where the hearth is warm, + A halo, like an angel's, on her hair. +She clasps a sleeping infant in her arm. + A holy presence hovers round her there, + And she, for all her mother-pains more fair, +Is happy, seeing that all sweet thoughts that stir +The hearts of men bear worship unto her. + +Another wanders where the cold wind blows, + Wet-haired, with eyes that sting one like a knife. +Homeless forever, at her bosom close + She holds the purchase of her love and life, + Of motherhood, unglorified as wife; +And bitterer than the world's relentless scorn +The knowing her child were happier never born. + +Whence are the halo and the fiery shame + That fashion thus a crown and curse of love? +Have roted words such power to bless and blame? + Ay, men have stained a raven from many a dove, + And all the grace and all the grief hereof +Are the two words which bore one's lips apart +And which the other hoarded in her heart. + +He who stooped down and wrote upon the sand, + The God-heart in him touched to tenderness, +Saw deep, saw what we cannot understand, -- + We, who draw near the shrine of one to bless + The while we scourge another's sore distress, +And judge like gods between the ill and good, +The glory and the guilt of womanhood. + + + + +October + + + +The thought of old, dear things is in thine eyes, +O, month of memories! +Musing on days thine heart hath sorrow of, +Old joy, dead hope, dear love, + +I see thee stand where all thy sisters meet +To cast down at thy feet +The garnered largess of the fruitful year, +And on thy cheek a tear. + +Thy glory flames in every blade and leaf +To blind the eyes of grief; +Thy vineyards and thine orchards bend with fruit +That sorrow may be mute; + +A hectic splendor lights thy days to sleep, +Ere the gray dusk may creep +Sober and sad along thy dusty ways, +Like a lone nun, who prays; + +High and faint-heard thy passing migrant calls; +Thy lazy lizard sprawls +On his gray stone, and many slow winds creep +About thy hedge, asleep; + +The sun swings farther toward his love, the south, +To kiss her glowing mouth; +And Death, who steals among thy purpling bowers, +Is deeply hid in flowers. + +Would that thy streams were Lethe, and might flow +Where lotus blossoms blow, +And all the sweets wherewith thy riches bless +Might hold no bitterness! + +Would, in thy beauty, we might all forget +Dead days and old regret, +And through thy realm might fare us forth to roam, +Having no thought for home! + +And yet I feel, beneath thy queen's attire, +Woven of blood and fire, +Beneath the golden glory of thy charm +Thy mother heart beats warm, + +And if, mayhap, a wandering child of thee, +Weary of land and sea, +Should turn him homeward from his dreamer's quest +To sob upon thy breast, + +Thine arm would fold him tenderly, to prove +How thine eyes brimmed with love, +And thy dear hand, with all a mother's care, +Would rest upon his hair. + + + + +The Old Clock + + + +All day low clouds and slanting rain +Have swept the woods and dimmed the plain. +Wet winds have swayed the birch and oak, +And caught and swirled away the smoke, +But, all day long, the wooden clock + Went on, Nic-noc, nic-noc. + +When deep at night I wake with fear, +And shudder in the dark to hear +The roaring storm's unguided strength, +Peace steals into my heart at length, +When, calm amid the shout and shock, + I hear, Nic-noc, nic-noc. + +And all the winter long 't is I +Who bless its sheer monotony -- +Its scorn of days, which cares no whit +For time, except to measure it: +The prosy, dozy, cosy clock, + Nic-noc, nic-noc, nic-noc! + + + + +Tear Stains + + + +Tear-marks stain from page to page + This book my fathers left to me, -- +So dull that nothing but its age + Were worth its freight across the sea. + +But tear stains! When, by whom, and why? + Thus takes my fancy to its wings; +For grief is old, and one may cry + About so many things! + + + + +A Prayer + + + +If many years should dim my inward sight, + Till, stirred with no emotion, +I might stand gazing at the fall of night + Across the gloaming ocean; + +Till storm, and sun, and night, vast with her stars, + Would seem an oft-told story, +And the old sorrow of heroic wars + Be faded of its glory; + +Till, hearing, while June's roses blew their musk, + The noise of field and city, +The human struggle, sinking tired at dusk, + I felt no thrill of pity; + +Till dawn should come without her old desire, + And day brood o'er her stages, -- +O let me die, too frail for nature's hire, + And rest a million ages. + + + + +She Being Young + + + +The home of love is her blue eyes, +Wherein all joy, all beauty lies, +More sweet than hopes of paradise, + She being young. + +Speak of her with a miser's praise; +She craves no golden speech; her ways +Wind through charmed nights and magic days, + She being young. + +She is so far from pain and death, +So warm her cheek, so sweet her breath +Glad words are all the words she saith, + She being young. + +Seeing her face, it seems not far +To Troy's heroic field of war, +To Troy and all great things that are, + She being young. + + + + +Paul Jones + + + +A century of silent suns + Have set since he was laid on sleep, +And now they bear with booming guns + And streaming banners o'er the deep +A withered skin and clammy hair + Upon a frame of human bones: +Whose corse? We neither know nor care, + Content to name it John Paul Jones. + +His dust were as another's dust; + His bones -- what boots it where they lie? +What matter where his sword is rust, + Or where, now dark, his eagle eye? +No foe need fear his arm again, + Nor love, nor praise can make him whole; +But o'er the farthest sons of men + Will brood the glory of his soul. + +Careless though cenotaph or tomb + Shall tower his country's monument, +Let banners float and cannon boom, + A million-throated shout be spent, +Until his widowed sea shall laugh + With sunlight in her mantling foam, +While, to his tomb or cenotaph, + We bid our hero welcome home. + +Twice exiled, let his ashes rest + At home, afar, or in the wave, +But keep his great heart with us, lest + Our nation's greatness find its grave; +And, while the vast deep listens by, + When armored wrong makes terms to right, +Keep on our lips his proud reply, + "Sir, I have but begun to fight!" + + + + +The Drudge + + + +Repose upon her soulless face, + Dig the grave and leave her; +But breathe a prayer that, in his grace, +He who so loved this toiling race + To endless rest receive her. + +Oh, can it be the gates ajar + Wait not her humble quest, +Whose life was but a patient war +Against the death that stalked from far + With neither haste nor rest; + +To whom were sun and moon and cloud, + The streamlet's pebbly coil, +The transient, May-bound, feathered crowd, +The storm's frank fury, thunder-browed, + But witness of her toil; + +Whose weary feet knew not the bliss + Of dance by jocund reed; +Who never dallied at a kiss! +If heaven refuses her, life is + A tragedy indeed! + + + + +The Wife + + + +They locked him in a prison cell, + Murky and mean. +She kissed him there a wife's farewell + The bars between. +And when she turned to go, the crowd, +Thinking to see her shamed and bowed, +Saw her pass out as calm and proud + As any queen. + +She passed a kinsman on the street, + To whose sad eyes +She made reply with smile as sweet + As April skies. +To one who loved her once and knew +The sorrow of her life, she threw +A gay word, ere his tale was due + Of sympathies. + +She met a playmate, whose red rose + Had never a thorn, +Whom fortune guided when she chose + Her marriage morn, +And, smiling, looked her in the eye; +But, seeing the tears of sympathy, +Her smile died, and she passed on by + In quiet scorn. + +They could not know how, when by night + The city slept, +A sleepless woman, still and white, + The watches kept; +How her wife-loyal heart had borne +The keen pain of a flowerless thorn, +How hot the tears that smiles and scorn + Had held unwept. + + + + +Vision + + + +The wintry sun was pale + On hill and hedge; +The wind smote with its flail + The seeded sedge; +High up above the world, + New taught to fly, +The withered leaves were hurled + About the sky; +And there, through death and dearth, + It went and came, -- +The Glory of the earth + That hath no name. + +I know not what it is; + I only know +It quivers in the bliss + Where roses blow, +That on the winter's breath + It broods in space, +And o'er the face of death + I see its face, +And start and stand between + Delight and dole, +As though mine eyes had seen + A living Soul. + +And I have followed it, + As thou hast done, +Where April shadows flit + Beneath the sun; +In dawn and dusk and star, + In joy and fear, +Have seen its glory far + And felt it near, +And dared recall his name + Who stood unshod +Before a fireless flame, + And called it God. + + + + +September + + + +I have not been among the woods, +Nor seen the milk-weeds burst their hoods, + +The downy thistle-seeds take wing, +Nor the squirrel at his garnering. + +And yet I know that, up to God, +The mute month holds her goldenrod, + +That clump and copse, o'errun with vines, +Twinkle with clustered muscadines, + +And in deserted churchyard places +Dwarf apples smile with sunburnt faces. + +I know how, ere her green is shed, +The dogwood pranks herself with red; + +How the pale dawn, chilled through and through, +Comes drenched and draggled with her dew; + +How all day long the sunlight seems +As if it lit a land of dreams, + +Till evening, with her mist and cloud, +Begins to weave her royal shroud. + +If yet, as in old Homer's land, +Gods walk with mortals, hand in hand, + +Somewhere to-day, in this sweet weather, +Thinkest thou not they walk together? + + + + +Barefooted + + + +The girls all like to see the bluets in the lane + And the saucy johnny-jump-ups in the meadow, +But, we boys, we want to see the dogwood blooms again, + Throwin' a sort of summer-lookin' shadow; +For the very first mild mornin' when the woods are white + (And we needn't even ask a soul about it) +We leave our shoes right where we pulled them off at night, + And, barefooted once again, we run and shout it: + You may take the country over -- + When the bluebird turns a rover, + And the wind is soft and hazy, + And you feel a little lazy, + And the hunters quit the possums -- + It's the time for dogwood blossoms. + +We feel so light we wish there were more fences here; + We'd like to jump and jump them, all together! +No sleds for us, no guns, nor even 'simmon beer, + No nothin' but the blossoms and fair weather! +The meadow is a little sticky right at first, + But a few short days 'll wipe away that trouble. +To feel so good and gay, I wouldn't mind the worst + That could be done by any field o' stubble. + O, all the trees are seemin' sappy! + O, all the folks are smilin' happy! + And there's joy in every little bit of room; + But the happiest of them all + At the Shanghai rooster's call + Are we barefoots when the dogwoods burst abloom! + + + + +Pardon Time + + + +Give over now; forbear. The moonlight steeps +In silver silence towered castle-keeps + And cottage crofts, where apples bend the bough. +Peace guards us round, and many a tired heart sleeps. + Let me brush back the shadow from your brow. + Give over now. + +On such a night, how sweet, how sweet is life, +Even to the insect piper with his fife! + And must your troubled face still bear the blight +Of strength that runs itself to waste in strife? + For love's own heart should throb through all the light + Of such a night. + + + + +The Rattlesnake + + + +Coiled like a clod, his eyes the home of hate, +Where rich the harvest bows, he lies in wait, +Linking earth's death and music, mate with mate. + +Is 't lure, or warning? Those small bells may sing +Like Ariel sirens, poised on viewless wing, +To lead stark life where mailed death is king; + +Else nature's voice, in that cold, earthy thrill, +Bids good avoid the venomed fang of ill, +And life and death fight equal in her will. + + + + +The Prisoner + + + +From pacing, pacing without hope or quest +He leaned against his window-bars to rest +And smelt the breeze that crept up from the west. + +It came with sundown noises from the moors, +Of milking time and loud-voiced rural chores, +Of lumbering wagons and of closing doors. + +He caught a whiff of furrowed upland sweet, +And certain scents stole up across the street +That told him fireflies winked among the wheat. + +Over the dusk hill woke a new moon's light, +Shadowed the woods and made the waters white, +And watched above the quiet tents of night. + +Alas, that the old Mother should not know +How ached his heart to be entreated so, +Who heard her calling and who could not go! + + + + +Sonnet + + + +To-day was but a dead day in my hands. + Hour by hour did nothing more than pass, + Mere idle winds above the faded grass. +And I, as though a captive held in bands, +Who, seeing a pageant, wonders much, but stands + Apart, saw the sun blaze his course with brass + And sink into his fabled sea of glass +With glory of farewell to many lands. + +Thou knowest, thou who talliest life by days, + That I have suffered more than pain of toil, + Ah, more than they whose wounds are soothed with oil, +And they who see new light on beaten ways! +The prisoner I, who grasps his iron bars +And stares out into depth on depth of stars! + + + + +Folk Song + + + +When merry milkmaids to their cattle call + At evenfall + And voices range +Loud through the gloam from grange to quiet grange, + +Wild waif-songs from long distant lands and loves, + Like migrant doves, + Wake and give wing +To passion dust-dumb lips were wont to sing. + +The new still holds the old moon in her arms; + The ancient charms + Of dew and dusk +Still lure her nomad odors from the musk, + +And, at each day's millennial eclipse, + On new men's lips, + Some old song starts, +Made of the music of millennial hearts, + +Whereto one listens as from long ago + And learns to know + That one day's tears +And love and life are as a thousand years', + +And that some simple shepherd, singing of + His pain and love, + May haply find +His heart-song speaks the heart of all his kind. + + + + +"97": The Fast Mail + + + +Where the rails converge to the station yard +She stands one moment, breathing hard, + +And then, with a snort and a clang of steel, +She settles her strength to the stubborn wheel, + +And out, through the tracks that lead astray, +Cautiously, slowly she picks her way, + +And gathers her muscle and guards her nerve, +When she swings her nose to the westward curve, + +And takes the grade, which slopes to the sky, +With a bound of speed and a conquering cry. + +The hazy horizon is all she sees, +Nor cares for the meadows, stirred with bees, + +Nor the long, straight stretches of silent land, +Nor the ploughman, that shades his eye with his hand, + +Nor the cots and hamlets that know no more +Than a shriek and a flash and a flying roar; + +But, bearing her tidings, she trembles and throbs, +And laughs in her throat, and quivers and sobs; + +And the fire in her heart is a red core of heat, +That drives like a passion through forest and street, + +Till she sees the ships in their harbor at rest, +And sniffs at the trail to the end of her quest. + +If I were the driver who handles her reins, +Up hill and down hill and over the plains, + +To watch the slow mountains give back in the west, +To know the new reaches that wait every crest, + +To hold, when she swerves, with a confident clutch, +And feel how she shivers and springs to the touch, + +With the snow on her back and the sun in her face, +And nothing but time as a quarry to chase, + +I should grip hard my teeth, and look where she led, +And brace myself stooping, and give her her head, + +And urge her, and soothe her, and serve all her need, +And exult in the thunder and thrill of her speed. + + + + +Sundown + + + +Hills, wrapped in gray, standing along the west; + Clouds, dimly lighted, gathering slowly; +The star of peace at watch above the crest -- + Oh, holy, holy, holy! + +We know, O Lord, so little what is best; + Wingless, we move so lowly; +But in thy calm all-knowledge let us rest -- + Oh, holy, holy, holy! + + + + +At Sea + + + +When the dim, tall sails of the ships were in motion, + Ghostly, and slow, and silent-shod, +We gazed where the dusk fled over the ocean, + A great gray hush, like the shadow of God. + +The sky dome cut with its compass in sunder + A circle of sea from the darkened land, -- +A circle of tremulous waste and wonder, + O'er which one groped with a childish hand. + +The true stars came to their stations in heaven, + The false stars shivered deep down in the sea, +And the white crests went like monsters, driven + By winds that never would let them be, + +And there, where the elements mingled and muttered, + We stood, each man with a lone dumb heart, +Full of the vastness that never was uttered + By symbol of words or by echo of art. + + + + +L'envoi + + + +God willed, who never needed speech, + "Let all things be:" +And, lo, the starry firmament + And land and sea +And his first thought of life that lives + In you and me. + +His circle of eternity + We see in part; +Our spirits are his breath, our hearts + Beat from his heart; +Hence we have played as little gods + And called it art. + +Lacking his power, we shared his dream + Of perfect things; +Between the tents of hope and sweet + Rememberings +Have sat in ashes, but our souls + Went forth on wings. + +Where life fell short of some desire + In you and me, +Feeling for beauty which our eyes + Could never see, +Behold, from out the void we willed + That it should be, + +And sometimes dreamed our lisping songs + Of humanhood +Might voice his silent harmony + Of waste and wood, +And he, beholding his and ours, + Might find it good. + + + + +[End of original text.] + + + + + +Notes: + + + +John Charles McNeill was born in Scotland County, near Laurinburg, +North Carolina, on 26 July 1874, and died on 17 October 1907 +(when he was 33 years old). He only produced this one volume before he died, +though he planned a second, which was published posthumously. +"Songs, Merry and Sad", first published in Charlotte in 1906, +went through at least five printings over more than 60 years. +(This text is taken from the very first edition.) + +Both of McNeill's grandfathers came from Scotland. + +McNeill attended Wake Forest College, where he received both +his Bachelor's and Master's degrees. In 1899-1900 he taught English +at Mercer University. + +Some of his poems were published nationally as early as 1901. +More of his poems were published by `The Charlotte Observer' starting in 1903, +and in 1904 he joined its staff. + + +This etext was created by entering the text (manually) twice, +once from the first printing (1906) and once from the second printing +(no date), and comparing the two. There were some slight differences +in the two printings. + +A portrait of John Charles McNeill faces the title page (p. 3) +in the second printing, but is absent in the first. + +The first printing gives the publisher as Stone & Barringer Co. +and gives the date as 1906. The second printing gives the publisher +as Stone Publishing Co., and gives no date. Both were printed +in Charlotte, N.C. + +One error was corrected (the second printing also corrected this error): + +(p. 73) +[ A holy presence hovers round here there, ] + changed to: +[ A holy presence hovers round her there, ] + + +The second printing also changed the title of the poem +[ To Melvin Gardner: Suicide ], on p. 19, to [ To Melvin Gardner: ] +-- in the text, but not in the table of Contents. This may have been done +in deference to the family -- attitudes on suicide were once quite different +than now -- but as it has been quite some time, and the original title +gives more meaning to the poem, it has been retained. + +The Title of the poem [ Now! ] did not have the exclamation point +in the table of Contents. It has been added to match the text. +The Title of the poem [ "97": The Fast Mail ] appeared as such +in the text, but as ["97:" The Fast Mail ] in the Contents. +The latter was changed to match the text. + +In the original, the book's title does not separate the Contents +from the first poem. It has been placed there as a sort of divider. + +In two places ASCII fails to provide enough characters for a correct rendering. +They are the words Provencal (the c with a cedilla) and mailed +(the e with an acute accent, to indicate that the word is to be said +with two syllables). These occur in "Reminiscence" and "The Rattlesnake". + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Songs, Merry and Sad, by John Charles McNeill + diff --git a/old/sngms10.zip b/old/sngms10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4301ad9 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/sngms10.zip |