1 I . CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND GIVEN IN 1891 BY HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE Cornell University Library PS 614.013 The masque of poets:a collection of new 3 1924 022 499 275 The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022499275 THE MASQUE OF POETS THE MASQUE OF POETS A Collection of New Poems by Contemporary American Poets EDITED BY EDWARD J. O'BRIEN NEW YORK DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 1918 Copyright, 1917, 1918, Bf DODD, MEAU AND COMPANY, Inc. TO J.-F. RAICHE CONTENTS PAGE Introduction xi Nocturne of Remembered Spring. Conrad Aiken 1 A Pilgrimage. Nancy Barr Mavity .... 9 There Lived a Lady in Milan William Rose Benet 12 East Side Moving Picture Theatre — Sunday. Maxwell Bodenheim 17 Factory-Girl. Maxwell Bodenheim .... 18 A Chronicle. William Stanley Braithwaite . 19 The Wet Woods. William Stanley Braithwaite 20 Twenty Stars to Match His Face. William Stanley Braithwaite 21 The Name. Anna Hempstead Branch ... 22 The Plume. Abbie Farwell Brown .... 27 Calypso. Amelia Josephine Burr 29 I Come and Go. Witter Bynner 31 Moment Musicale. Bliss Carman .... 32 Alexandra. Sarah N. Cleghorn 33 Clouds. Lincoln Colcord 36 The Return of Jeanne d'Arc Grace Hazard Conkling 37 vli viii CONTENTS PAGE Duo. Olive Tilford Dargan 44 Fatherland. Olive Tilford Dargan .... 48 Prayer Before Summer. Arthur Davison Ficke 51 Near Yarmouth. John Gould Fletcher ... 53 Rooms. John Gould Fletcher 55 Afternoon. Fannie Stearns Gifford .... 57 Overseas. Abbie Carter Goodloe .... 59 Animals. Alfred Kreymborg 63 Preludes. Alfred Kreymborg 65 Our Guardian Angels and Their Children. Vachel Lindsay 69 The Ring and the Castle. Amy Lowell . . 73 Shore Grass. Amy Lowell 81 Smells. Christopher Morley 82 An April Sequence. Edward J. O'Brien . . 83 In Late Spring. Charles L. O'Donnell ... 87 Exiles. Vincent O'Sullivan 88 Far Up in the Mystery Hills. Vincent O'Sullivan 89 He Sings Because His Wife Has Gone Out of the House. Vincent O'Sullivan ... 90 Rainy Day. Vincent O'Sullivan 92 Defeat. William Alexander Percy .... 93 To Butterfly. William Alexander Percy . . 95 Chloe to Amaryllis. Lizette Woodworth Reese % Genevieve and Alexandra. Edwin Arlington Robinson 98 CONTENTS IX Drumnotes. Carl Sandburg .... An Old Inn by the Sea. Odell Shepard The Flock at Evening. Odell Shepard The First Food. George Sterling Llewellyn, Prince op Cambria. Charles Wharton Stork . At Midnight. Sara Teasdale . The Embers Speak. Thomas Walsh Laggard. Margaret Widdemer . FAQE 116 117 119 122 124 131 132 133 xii INTRODUCTION bethans. But I think that America today reflects very much tlie same spirit of adventurous seeking that England knew more than three centuries ago, and that this spirit will not find its happiest fulfilment till it becomes less personal in its consciousness of a public, and more disinterested in its practice as an art. That the American poets who have contributed to " The Masque of Poets " are disinterested, is proven by their desire to remain anonymous when these poems were first published. Elizabethan poets sang out of pure joy and good fellowship, and the finest American achievement of the last decade has been born of sim- ilar joy and good fellowship. I should like to see American poetry published anonymously in such anthologies as this and left for judgment to the public irrespective of authors' signatures. That the authors of these poems now disclose their parenthood is in order that the public may satisfy itself that good work can receive acknowledgment and interested recognition for its own sake, as these poems have been welcomed INTRODUCTION xiii during their serial appearance in " The Bookman." In " The Masque of Poets " many schools and many ideals now meet for the first time on common ground, and diverse points of view only serve to reveal the essential unity of inspiration behind what we are all trying to do. Much discussion has raged during the past three years or more as to whether what Amer- ica is producing is new poetry or old poetry. The best solution that I can find is that it is just poetry. Magic, passion, and truth are what poets have always sought, and what all poets who are now sincere are still seeking. Interests change, as fashions change, but the stuff of poetry is always the same, and the circle which begins with the Greek anthology is com- pleted in Imagism, as the circle which begins with Crabbe and Ebenezer Jones is completed in the social poetry of America to-day. What is new in American poetry is fresh experience of life, and I find this as richly expressed in the traditional poetry of Anna xiv INTRODUCTION Hempstead Branch as in the supposedly radical poetry of Amy Lowell. These statements should be platitudes, but they are so universally denied nowa- days, that I suppose I should claim them as canons of "the new criticism." Be this as it may, the reader of this anthology will find herein whatever is most authentic and genuinely felt in contemporary Ameri- can poetry. I do not claim completeness for this series of poems, but I do claim that it is representative. I regret the absence of several contributors whose contributions to the spiritual life of our day have been notable, but the war has had a numbing effect on many minds, and in other cases poets have recently published volumes containing every manuscript' that they cared to print. Five years from now it would be interesting to repeat this experiment, and I think the results would prove that very little change had taken place in the substance of our poetry, though the manner of its INTRODUCTION xv weaving might be different. As this series now stands, I commend it to the public who are adventurers all in life as our poets are adventurers in art. Edward J. O'Brien. South Yarmouth, Mass., New Year's Day, 1918. THE MASQUE OF POETS NOCTURNE OF REMEMBERED SPRING CONRAD AIKEN I Moonlight silvers the shaken tops of trees, Moonlight whitens the lilac-shadowed wall; And through the soft-starred evening fall Clearly as if through enchanted seas Footsteps passing an infinite distance away, In another world, and another day. Moonlight turns the purple lilacs to blue, Moonlight leaves the fountain hoar and old. Moonlight whitens the sleepy dew. And the boughs of elms grow green and cold. . . Our footsteps echo on gleaming stones; The leaves are stirred to a jargon of muted tones. This is the night we have kept, you say; This is the moonlight night that never will die. . , Let us return there, let us return, you and I, — Through the grey streets our memories retain Let us go back again. [ 1 ] CONRAD AIKEN II Mist goes up from the river to dim the stars, The river is black and cold; so let us dance To a tremor of violins and troubled guitars, And flare of horns, and clang of cymbals, and drums; And strew the glinamering floor with petals of roses And remember, while rich music yawns and closes. With a luxury of pain, how silence comes. . . . Yes, we have loved each other, long ago; We moved like wind to a music's ebb and flow At a phrase from the violins you closed your eyes, And smiled, and let me lead you . . . how young we were! Waves of music beneath us dizzied to rise. Your hair, upon that music, seemed to stir. . . . Let us return there, let us return, you and I. Through changeless streets our memories retain Let us go back again. [2 ] NOCTURNE OF REMEMBERED SPRING III Mist goes up from the rain-steeped earth, and clings Ghostly with lamplight among drenched maple trees, We walk in silence, and see how the lamplight flings Fans of shadow upon it . . . the music's mournful pleas Die out behind us, the door is closed at last, A net of silver silence is softly cast Over our dreams . . . slowly and softly we walk, Quietly, with delicious pause, we talk, Of foolish trivial things, of life and death. Time and forgetfulness, and dust and truth, — Lilacs and youth. You laugh, I hear the after-taken breath, You darken your eyes and turn away your head At something I have said — Some tremulous intuition that flew too deep, And struck a plangent chord . . . to-night, to-night. You will remember it as you fall asleep, [ 3 ] CONRAD AIKEN Your dream will suddenly blossom with sharp de- light. . . . Good-night! you say. . . . The leaves of the lilac softly dip and sway, The purple spikes of bloom Nod their sweetness upon us, and lift again. Your white face turns away, — I am caught with pain, — And silence descends . . . and the dripping of dew from the eaves And jewelled points of leaves, IV I walk in a pleasure of sorrow along the street And try to remember you . . . the slow drops patter, The mist upot the lilacs has made them sweet, I brush them with my sleeve, the cool drops scatter, And suddenly I laugh . . . and stand and listen As if another had laughed ... a fragrant gust Rustles the laden leaves, the wet spikes glisten, [ 4 ] NOCTURNE OF REMEMBERED SPRING A shower of drops goes down on stones and dust. And it seems as though it were you who had shaken the bough, And spilled the fragrance — I pursue your face again, It grows more vague and lovely, it eludes me now. I remember that you are gone, and drown in pain. Something there was I said to you, I recall. Something, just as the music seemed to fall. That made you laugh, and burns me still with pleasure. . . . What were the words — the words like dripping fire? . . . I remember them now, and smile, and in sweet leisure Rehearse the scene, more exquisite than before, And you more beautiful, and I more wise. . . . Lilacs, and spring, and night, and your clear eyes, And you, in white, by the darkness of a door. . . . These things, like voices weaving to richest music, Flow and fall in the cool night of my mind, [5 ] CONRAD AIKEN I pursue your ghost among green leaves that are ghostly, I pursue you, but cannot find. . . . And suddenly, with a pang that is sweetest of all, I become aware that I cannot remember you; The beautiful ghost I knew Has silently plunged in the shadows, shadows that stream and fall. V Let us go in and dance once more On the dream's glimmering floor. Beneath the balcony festooned with roses. Let us go in and dance once more. . . . The door behind us closes Against an evening purple with stars and mist. . • . Let us go in and keep our tryst With music and white roses, and spin around In lazy swirls of sound. Do you foresee me, married and grown old? . . . [6 ] NOCTURNE OF REMEMBERED SPRING And you, who smile about you at this room Dizzy with whirling dancers — is it foretold That you must step from tumult into a gloom, Forget me, love another, grow white and cold? No, you are Cleopatra, fiercely young, Laughing upon the topmost stair of night; Roses upon the desert must be flung. It is your wish. . . . Above us, light by light, Weaves the delirious darkness, petals fall, They fall upon your jewelled hands, they tremble upon your hair, — And music breaks in waves on the pillared wall, And you are Cleopatra, and do not care. . . . And so, in memory, you will always be — Young, and foolish, a thing of dream and mist; And so, perhaps, when all is disillusioned. And eternal spring returns once more. Bringing a ghost of lovelier springs remembered. You will remember me. [ 7 ] Missing Page Missing Page NAN CLARK BARR One a sun-dazzled wheat field Where the wind made a shadow road That rippled and wavered and beckoned, And in streams unchannelled flowed. One lay where the moonlight-colour Of oats, green -silvered, shone; And one where the purpling clover Close to my feet had grown. But the brown road fled before me, And would not let me stay To kneel at the shrines of the wayside. To lift up my heart and pray. So who was the saint, I know not. Who quiet healing wrought; For the road that had turned like a fancy. Lay straight as an iron thought: [ 10 ] A PILGRIMAGE Led back to my house of labour, To my garment of smoke-dimmed grey, And home from my pilgrimaging At the closing of the day. But lo! It was girdled with sunshine (0 where was the miracle shrine?) And my garment shone as the rainbow, And my heart sang aloud, for a sign ! [11 ] Missing Page Missing Page WILLIAM ROSE BENET From slouching dwarf and ranting priest. Yet, in the end, how am I wise? " Though with dividers and a quill I weave some miracle of will, — Say, that men fly, — though I design For peace or war a thousand things Gaining applause from dukes and kings, — Though soft and deft my colours shine, " Though my quick wit breed thunderbolts I may not loose on all these dolts. Things they are babes to comprehend, — Though from the crevice in stone or lime I trace grave outlines mocking Time, — I know when I am beaten. Friend ! " Say that there lived of old a saint Even Leonardo dared not paint, Even Leonardo dared not draw, — [ 14 ] THERE LIVED A LADY IN MILAN Too perfect in her breathing prime For colours to transmit to time Or quill attempt, — aye, ev'n in awe! " Say this, cold histories, and say I looked not on her from this day Lest frenzied I destroy my art. golden lily, — how she stands Listening! Beauty, — ah, your hands, Your little hands tear out my heart! " Do you not know you are so fair, Brighter than springtime in the air? What says your mirror to your mind?" " Phantom," she whispered, " Do you plead With ghostly gestures? . . . Ah, indeed, Pity a lady deaf and blind " Since birth! "... Then Leonardo turned Saluting, though the sunset burned [ 15 ] WILLIAM ROSE BENET In nimtus round her, — went his way In daze, repeating " God's defect, Even he! — and masterpiece elect! " He never saw her from that day. [16] EAST SIDE MOVING PICTURE THEATRE — SUNDAY MAXWELL BODENHEIM An old woman rubs her eyes As though she were stroking children back to life. A slender Jewish boy whose forehead Is tall, and like a wind-marked wall, Restlessly waits while leaping prayers Clash their light-cymbals within his eyes. And a little hunchbacked girl Straightens her back with a slow-pulling smile. (I am afraid to look at her again.) Then the blurred, tawdry pictures rush across the scene. And I hear a swishing intake of breath. As though some band of shy rigid spirits Were standing before their last heaven. [17 ] FACTORY-GIRL MAXWELL BODENHEIM Why are your eyes like dry brown flower-pods, Still, gripped by the memory of lost petals? I feel that, if I touched them, They would crumble to falling brown dust, And you would stand with blindness revealed. Yet you would not shrink, for your life Has been long since memorized, And eyes would only melt out against its high walls. Besides, in the making of boxes Sprinkled with crude forget-me-nots. One is curiously blessed if one's eyes are dead. [ 18 ] A CHRONICLE WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE All about the blown wind's ways, Never unbelieving, With a mellow, antique grace. And triumphant grieving, — Came across the meadow, Went beyond the hill. Thin as any shadow, Passed my chronicle. Earth writes the epitaph, Rain and leaves wear it : — Eyes to see, lips to laugh. Are my shadows near it. [ 19 ] THE WET WOODS WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE This path leads to the laurel, And that, winds to the burn: Hemlocks, pines, and birches, Know the one that I turn. It is wet in the woods to-day, — And perhaps, the sun to-morrow, Shall weave its gold, while away I will be alone with sorrow. [ 20 ] TWENTY STARS TO MATCH HIS FACE WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE Twenty stars to match his face, All the winds to blow his breath. In the dark no eye can trace Life or death. The word came, and out he went, Heard the unseen flutterings Of wings that showed the dream he sent, The song he sings. Twenty stars to match his face. The sea-foam, his permanence — There is no wind can mark his place Here, or hence. [21] THE NAME ANNA HEMPSTEAD BRANCH When I come back from secret dreams In gardens deep and fair, How very curious it seems — This mortal name I bear. For by this name I make their bread And trim the household light And sun the linen for the bed And close the door at night. I wonder who myself may be, And whence it was I came — Before the Church had laid on me This frail and earthly name. My sponsors spake unto the Lord And three things promised they. Upon my soul with one accord Their easy vows did lay. [ 22 ] THE NAME My ancient spirit heard them not. I think it was not there. But in a place they had forgot It drank a starrier air. Yes, in a silent place and deep — There did it dance and run, And sometimes it lay down to sleep Or sprang into the sun. The Priest saw not my aureole shine! My sweet wings saw not he ! He graved me with a solemn sign And laid a name on me. Now by this name I stitch and mend, The daughter of my home, By this name do I save and spend And when they call, I come. [23 ] Missing Page Missing Page ANNA HEMPSTEAD BRANCH And sun the linen for the bed And tend the fireside flame. By this Name do I answer yes — Word beautiful and true. By this I'll sew the bridal dress I shall put on for you. [ 26 ] THE PLUME ABBIE FARWELL BROWN " Here is a gift! " the Brownie said, As something fell on the little maid's head; " A golden feather with silver bars Of the Faraway Bird who sings to the stars! A beautiful plume to use as you will, Fortunate Friend on-top-of -the-Hill ! Fasten it into your curly hair, — Love will follow and find you fair. Put it into the Magi's hands, — They will pay you with gold and lands. Feather a shaft with the magic thing. And bring down Fame with a crippled wing. Other wonders the plume can do. But I wouldn't bother, if I were you! " Now the queer little maid on-top-of-the-Hill Clipped the plume to a scratchy quill, — The golden feather with silver bars Of the Faraway Bird who sings to the stars! [ 27 ] Missing Page Missing Page AMELIA JOSEPHINE BURR / have sent him back at the gods' decree — / have sent him back to Ithaca. Never will I walk again beside the twilight sea On the shore that looks toward Ithaca Lest the wind should bring to him a breath of days gone by, Of the beauty and the sorrow of his madness, that was I — Peace to him and his, Zeus! I ask no more of thee. Peace upon that home in Ithaca! [30 ] I COME AND GO WITTER BYNNER I come and go And never stay. I pick and choose A night, a day, I find, I lose, I laugh along, I will not know Right things from wrong. I pity those Who pity me, I ask no boon. But being free . . . And so the moon. My polished stone, Shines and shows I lie alone. [31 ] MOMENT MUSICALE BUSS CARMAN The round moon hangs above the rim Of silent and blue shadowed trees, And all the earth is vague and dim In its blue veil of mysteries. On such a night one must believe The Golden Age returns again With lyric beauty, to retrieve The world from dreariness and pain. And down the wooded aisles, behold What dancers through the dusk appear! Piping their rapture as of old, They bring immortal freedom near. A moment on the brink of night They tread their transport in the dew. And to the rhythm of their delight, Behold, all things are made anew! [ 32 ] ALEXANDRA SARAH N. CLEGHORN Breasting white whirlwinds On the drift-bound mountains, Challenging the sleet-edged March wind's mirth: Far in summer woodlands Whelmed in the storm and thunder (Fearless filial daughter Of the kind brown earth), the bonny, strong, courageous health of Alexandra ! Deep thoughts, wide thoughts Fill her tranquil musing. Make her clear cheek colour And her still breast rise: These with steadfast labour, Skilled and single-hearted. Safe she founds on homely soil, And rears them to the skies! the sword-bright, reason-proving mind of Alexandra ! [ 33 ] SARAH N. CLEGHORN Robust and tender Is her home-grown feeling; Swift her espousal, Of the kindmost's part; Instinct her free faith And her loyal valour; Native to her west-bom. Fellow-caring heart. Wide as heaven and warm as home, the heart of Alex- andra! Far forward-looking Is her candid spirit, Is her gallant, gracious, Calm and open soul. Like an ox for service. Like a bird for freedom. Moves her lucid purpose. Single toward its goal. Such the spirit high and fine that bums in Alexandra) [34] ALEXANDRA Sayest thou, this picture Paints no earthly woman? Nay, but in our Valley Is her dwelling-place. Nay, for yester-even Did I walk beside her. Listened to her low voice, Looked upon her face, Ay, my comrade long and well-beloved, Alexandra! [35] CLOUDS LINCOLN COLCORD The clouds rise over the high mountains, They rise over the rim of the sea . . . While I was looking away, the first one rose. Swift, swift, swift. Still like birds, silent like thoughts, inexorable like time . . . I have tried — I cannot stop them! It was all light a while ago — all clear: Now they have put out the sky. I should not have looked away. [36 ] THE RETURN OF JEANNE D'ARC grace hazard conkling Jeanne d'Arc Why do the vales of Paradise Turn very France before my eyes, With linked rivers, chain on chain, Cool Meuse and amber-sandaled Aisne, Angelic Oise serenely fleet. And wayward Rhone on winged feet? There gleams the Loire through lace of trees. Shod as of old with silences. And there with Paris at its breast. The white Seine lies along the west, How wistful ! Nay, my serious Seine, Will nothing make thee smile again? Has any gargoyle peering down From Notre Dame with hostile frown Invaded thy still dreams at night? Dost thou lament the lost delight [37] GRACE HAZARD CONKLING Of years long gone? I wonder why Proud Paris veils her from the sky In twilight vesture like a nun? I wonder, what has heaven done? The lights are dead, the land is grey. Like ghosts the pale roads drift away Into the North! Oh, I would see What years have wrought in Domremy, And how great Rheims above the town Lifts praying hands! I must go down Among my people, I must know What makes my heart remember so, And why the voices cry so near. The human voices that I hear! The Men of France Now Mary lend thee out of heaven For dear defence of rivers seven, [38 ] THE RETURN OF JEANNE D'ARC And shattered gateways of the North! Angel of France, oh, lead us forth! Jeanne d'Arc They are invaded! They have need Of my heart's faith! Yea, I will lead. But can they follow when I go Unseen and vague as winds that blow? Yet shepherd winds control the day, To make the poplars lean one way. To ruffle rivers into gold. Herd home the clouds into far fold. And tirelessly evoke the shy Wild iris latent in the sky! Can my wing'd spirit so persuade Their hearts to follow unafraid? The Men of France Now Michael gird thee with his sword. To thrust aside the alien horde, [39] Missing Page Missing Page GRACE HAZARD CONKLING There was a Chinon nightingale That sang all night, "You will not fail! " And there were always saintly trees And dim old flowery villages, And rain-pricked pools like fretted shields. And sunny hills, and mellow fields. Oh, there was France! So now she lies Appealing-sweet before my eyes. Her wide flush rivers for delight Her spires and poplars to invite The eyes and thoughts toward Heaven! Men, I fight beside you once again. As those brief centuries ago. Each man of you a man I know! In Paradise I have not seen Faces more steadfast and serene. Let them not tear the temple down That holds the soul of Rouen town, [42 1 THE RETURN OF JEANNE D'ARC Nor crush the lilies Amiens wears, Nor those fair vines along the stairs Of Chartres, where some hand unknown Lured leaf and fruit from silver stone. This sunward hour of deepening dawn Brings glory of your comrades gone, And Rheims' lost bells are ringing! The Men of France Hark! It is her voice! Jeanne d'Arc! Jeanne d'Arc! [43] Missing Page Missing Page OLIVE TILFORD DARGAN Over ages winging Again the angels come. Holy love and human In her worship rise. 0, the light on woman Shed from children's eyes! To the factories feeding Hands and soul and will; Herded, and unheeding She is woman still. Trembling home in gloom light. Home — mock of breath! In her eyes the loom-blight. In her shadow, death! Sons must pass to battle; Armour them with prayers; Never conflict's rattle Reach thy straining ears; [46 ] DUO In the home they've made thee, Mother, sit thee down ; With their love they'll shade thee, With their fortmie crown! Be it or here or yonder, Where'er thy children cry, Far as thy fairest wander. Far as thy dearest die, — Be thine the heart that fareth Past every dim frontier. Till who the last rood dareth Shall find a mother there! [47] FATHERLAND OLIVE TILFORD DARGAN Come fingered as a friend, Death! Unfrock me, flesh and bone; These frills of smile and moan. These laces, traces, all unpin; These veins that net me in, This ever lassoing breath. Remove from me. If here is aught to free! To know these hills nor wait for feet! Earth, to be thy child at last! Thy roads all mine, and no white gate Inevitably fast! To enter where thy banquets are When storms are called to feast; And find thy hidden pantry stair When Spring with thee would guest; [48 ] FATHERLAND Into thine attic windows step From humbled Himalays, And round thy starry cornice creep Waylaying deities; Though for my hand Space hold out spheres like roses, and Like country lanes her orbits blow — My Earth, I know, If thou be green and blossom still, That I must downward go; Leave stars to keep House as they will ; The winds to walk or turn and sleep, Seas to spare or kill ; Behind my back shall sunsets burn Bereft of my concern; Each wonder passed Shall feed my haste, [49 ] OLIVE TILFORD DARGAN Till I have paused, as now, Beneath a bending orchard bough,- An April apple-bough, Where southern waters creep. [ 50] PRAYER BEFORE SUMMER ARTHUR DAVISON FICKE Once more across the frozen hills Comes the premonitory breath Of violets and of daffodils Returning from their masque of death; And barren branches faintly shake To the vibrations of the sun; In the blue sky swift wings awake: The dance of April is begun. Again the evening woods will be Aisles for our trysting feet; again The summer light on land and sea Will make the paths of wonder plain. Beloved — since the indifferent Powers That shaped our fibres deign to will That one more summer-flush be ours, Ours the bright wave, the flowering hill — [ 51 ] ARTHUR DAVISON FICKE Cannot some wisdom from the past Make gay and gentle in its mood This April passage, through the vast Confusions, toward our quietude? — And sense of briefness come to lay Its spell, as might the dreaming moon, On the poor actors in this play That ends so starkly and so soon? [52 ] NEAR YARMOUTH (To Edward J. O'Brien) JOHN GOULD FLETCHER The river holds no more the fishing boats, For long ago the last one rotted away: And down its ever-meandering curves of blue, No masts jut out, eager to fight the spray. But on dim winter nights, When two by two the lights Burn out among the sleepy villages Which line its banks; The clouds roll over, heavy ranks, from seaward, And storm the steep waves of the sky. These are like scudding barks with hoisted sail. These are blue fishing smacks, setting forth for the shoal of stars; Lot Tubman or Amos Barker holds the wheel. While through the sky before the wind they reel. [ 53 ] JOHN GOULD FLETCHER And the long lines of rain Descend upon the earth like ghostly trawl-lines: But ere the yawning chimneys blow smoke into the morning, The river sleeps, the boats are gone again. [54] ROOMS JOHN GOULD FLETCHER There is nothing on earth more lonely than a room; Outdoors are stately silent places, Filled with unchanging friendly faces, Sharing our triumph or our doom. But here where four flat walls share everything With the sunlight filtering through the window-panes. Life seems a row of black and polished grains Listlessly slipping down an endless string. Death paces up and down in each room we have; Each room is a tabernacle filled with little deaths. Pale drifting moments! Their enfeebled breaths Only stirred once, then settled in the grave. And over them all there broods one changeless thought. That we too in our time must so pass out; As passes the light across the walls, without Full knowledge of the goal it daily sought. [ 55 ] JOHN GOULD FLETCHER Impulse within a room swings to-and-fro, Shaping in letters hard and firm and clear, What all the world that scorns and slips us here Will never stop to read and never know : — " Seek God not in the forest but the cell ; " This is the lesson that our rooms can say. And though your tomb be open every day, There may be resurrection-dawns to tell. Who learns to think in rooms will conqjier thought; Who looks at walls will learn of patience' self; Who keeps a few books, oft-read, on a shelf Will enter in a kingdom safe, unbought. Who warms his hands at a grate's glowing breath Will find the warmth that runs through other hands, Who enters in a room and understands And knows that room is life, will pass unmoved through death. [ 56 ] AFTERNOON FANNIE STEARNS GIFFORD Some one is coming to call. Up the red brick path between daffodils dancing I see white rufiBes that blow: A parasol, dipping against the sun. It is some one stout, and warm in her new white gloves. My old green apron is smudged with the garden- mould. My hands are the hands of a peasant-woman. My hair Comes tumbling down into my eyes. I wish I could lie down flat like a child And hide in the grass, while she rings and rings. And sticks her card under the door with a sigh. And puffs away down the path. I wish — but the parasol bobs, [57 ] FANNIE STEARNS GIFFORD And she bobs like a mandarin's lady, Smiling and bridling and beckoning. If I were a daffodil, in an apron of green and gold — But there she stands on the path, Ajid her gloves are so new they squeak with newness and stoutness, And I know she will talk of the weather and stay an hour — If I were a daffodil — Or a little cool blinking bug Down in the daffodil leaves — [ 58 ] OVERSEAS In memory of Alan Seeger, killed in battle, Belloy-en-Santerre, July 4, 1916. ABBIE CARTER GOODLOE Across the vexed, insuperable sea, Afar, we call to him — alas, in vain ! No voice of passionate sweetness answers me, No gallant hand waves back to us again. Across relentless barriers of foam With useless tears our longing eyes we strain. And useless arms stretch forth to lure him home. He will not come to us! Afar, heart high, He fared to find fulfilment of his dreams. Athirst for romance, beaconing destiny. He sought what to fair youth the fairest seems. Singing he went — song ever on his lips — Bright Phosphor of clear poesy, whose beams Still shine on us even in his star's eclipse. [ 59 ] ABBIE CARTER GOODLOE Across the blue, the unreturning sea, Afar, we call to him — alas, I hear No more a voice that chants of liberty, No song thrill out the springtime of the year ! No clarion call from desolate Champagne Where roll red, ebbing battle-tides, or where The trampled vineland lapses to the Aisne. Silent the Meuse save for the cannon's roar. The bugle's note, the skyplanes' winnowing hum; Silent the reaches of the scarred north shore; Silent the shell-swept trenches of the Somme; Silent for evermore the lonely air Of all that lyric sweetness, hushed and dumb, Muted upon a hillside of Santerre. Hostage of our land's honour, by red ways, There on that bloody slope, 'neath flame-lit skies, With the brave few he yielded his brief days Battling for freedom's menaced liberties. [60 ] OVERSEAS Glimpsing, no more, horizons of romance, Nor love's bright paths, he turned stern, dying eyes Towards the fire-rimmed, " the brave frontiers of France." Oh, not for him, earth's tranquil, pleasant way! That fervent pulse which beat to life's desire, Leapt to the call of arms without dismay. No conscript of blind fate! Blithe heart afire With passionate zeal, he gave his latest breath As some enraptured martyr mounts the pyre And happily goes singing to his death. Spirit of flame and tears and tenderness! Singer and soldier, debonair and gay! Fond worshipper of earth's dear loveliness From Orizaba's snows to far Calais! Pilgrim of dreams! Knight-errant without fears! Alas, Death vanquished, should have turned away And spared thee to Life's utmost days and years. [ 61 ] ABBIE CARTER GOODLOE Useless, this vain complaining of thy will, Lord of Death ! Earth-born we bear our part - All thine inexorable laws fulfil. By thine appointed ways from earth depart. What boots it thee, cold Death, that mute, alone. Those ardent lips, that once intrepid heart. Sleep now quite passionless and overthrown? But oh, to us left all unsatisfied, What solace can there be for evermore? The fair fruition of his hopes denied. His last sigh breathed upon a distant shore ! How comfort us? — except, despite war's toll, Song has saved perfect from art's ravished store The imperishable essence of his soul ! [62 ] ANIMALS ALFRED KREYMBORG What animal you are or whether you are an animal, I am too dumb to tell. Some moments, I feel you've come out of the earth, out of some cool white stone deep down in the earth. Or there brushes past and lurks in a comer the thought that you slipped from a tree when the earth stopped spinning, that a blue shell brought you when the sea tired waltzing. You might be a mouse, the dryad of a woodpecker, or a pure tiny fish dream; [ 63 ] ALFRED KREYMBORG you might be something dropped from the sky, not a god-child — I wouldn't have you that — nor a cloud — though I love clouds. You're something not a bird, I can tell. If I could find you somewhere outside of me, I might tell — but inside? [64 ] PRELUDES ALFRED KREYMBORG If you Stand where I stand — in my boudoir — (don't mind my shaving — I can't afford a barber) — you can see into her boudoir — you can see milady — her back, her green smock, the bench she loves — ■ her hair always down in the morning — (the Sim conspiring with the curtains?) — reddish brown, with ringlets at the tips — the hairdresser called this A, M. — him I have to, I want to afford. Unhappily, you can't see her face — only the back of her small round head — and a glint of her ears, two glints — but her hands, alas, not her hands, though happily, you can hear them. [65 ] ALFRED KREYMBORG It isn't a clavichord — only a satinwood square — bought cheap at an auction — but it might be, you'd think it, a clavichord, bequeathed by the past — it sounds quite like feathers. Bach? Yes, who else could that be — whom else would you have in the morning — with the sun and milady? Grave? Yes, but so is the sun — not always? No, but please don't ponder — listen, hear the theme — hear it dig into the earth of harmonies. A dissonemce? No, 'twas only a stone — which powders into particles with the rest. Now follow the theme — down, down, into the soil — calling, evoking the spirit of birth — you hear those new tones — [66 J PRELUDES that sprinkle, that burst — roulade and arpeggio? Gently now, firmly — with solemn persuasion — hiding a whimsic raillery — (does a dead king raise his forefinger?) — though they would, though they might — no phrase can escape — the theme, the theme rules. Unhappy? Nay, nay — they ought to be happy — each is because of, in spite of, the other — that is democracy. He can't spare a particle — that priest of the morning sun — A mistake? Yes indeed, but — all the more human — would you have her drum like a schoolmaster - abominable right note at the right time — [ 67 ] ALFRED KREYMBORG in the morning, so early — or ever at all? She'll play it again — oh don't, please don't clap — you'll disturb them! Here, try my tobacco — good, a deep pipeful, eh? — an aromatic blend — my other extravagance — yes, I'll join you, but wait — I must first dry my face! [ 68 ] OUR GUARDIAN ANGELS AND THEIR CHILDREN VACHEL LINDSAY Where a river roars in rapids And doves in maples fret, Where peace has decked the pastures Our guardian angels met. Long they had sought each other In God's mysterious name, Had climbed the solemn chaos tides Alone, with hope aflame: Amid the demon deeps had wound By many a fearful way. As they beheld each other Their shout made glad the day. No need of purse delayed them, No hand of friend or kin — [ 69 ] VACHEL LINDSAY Nor menace of the bell and book, Nor fear of mortal sin. You did not speak, my girl, At this, our parting hour. Long we held each other And watched their deeds of power. They made a curious Eden. We saw that it was good. We thought with them in unison. We proudly understood Their amaranth eternal, Their roses strange and fair. The asphodels they scattered Upon the living air. They built a house of clouds With skilled, immortal hands. [ 70 ] OUR GUARDIAN ANGELS They entered through the silver doors. Their wings were wedded brands. I laboured up the valley To granite mountains free. You hurried down the river To Zidon by the sea. But at their place of meeting They keep a home and shrine. Your angel twists a purple flax, Then weaves a mantle fine. My angel, her defender Upstanding, spreads the light On painted clouds of fancy And mists that wrap the height. Their sturdy babes speak kindly And fly and run with joy, [ 71 ] VACHEL LINDSAY Shepherding the helpless lambs — A Grecian girl and boy. These children visit Heaven Each year and justify The time we cried and parted, And every dream and sigh. From books our God has written They sing of high desire. They turn the leaves in gentleness. Their wings are folded fire. [72T THE RING AND THE CASTLE A Ballad AMY LOWELL " Benjamin Bailey, Benjamin Bailey, why do you wake at the stroke of three? " " I heard the hoot of an owl in the forest, and the creak of the wind in the alder-tree." " Benjamin Bailey, Benjamin Bailey, why do you stare so into the dark? " " I saw white circles twining, floating, and in the centre a molten spark." " Why are you restless, Benjamin Bailey? Why do you fling your arms so wide? " " To keep the bat's wings from coming closer and push the grey rat from my side." " What are you muttering, Benjamin Bailey? The room is quiet, the moon is clear." [ 73 ] AMY LOWELL " The trees of the forest are curling, swaying, writhing over the heart of my Dear." " Lie down and cover you, Benjamin Bailey, you're raving, for never a wife or child Has blessed your hearthstone; it is the fever, which startles your brain with dreams so wild." " No wife indeed," said Benjamin Bailey, and his blue nails picked at the bedquilt's edge. " I gathered a rose in another man's garden and hid it from sight in a hawthorn hedge. " I made her a chamber where green boughs rustled, and plaited river-grass for the floor, And three times ten moonlight nights I loved her, with my old hound stretching before the door. "Then out of the North a knight came riding, with crested helm and pointed sword. [ 74 ] THE RING AND THE CASTLE ' Where is my wife,' said the knight to the people. ' My wife! My wife! ' was his only word. " He tied his horse to the alder yonder, and stooped his crest to enter my door. ' My wife,' said the knight, and a steel-grey glitter flashed from his armour across the floor. " Then I lied to that white-faced knight, and told him the lady had never been seen by me; And when he had loosed his horse from the alder, I bore him a mile of company. " I turned him over the bridge to the valley, and waved him Godspeed in the twilight grey. And I laughed all night as I toyed with his lady, clipping and kissing the hours away. " The sun was kind and the wind was gentle, and the green boughs over our chamber sang, [ 75 ] AMY LOWELL But on the Eastern breeze came a tinkle whenever the bells in the Abbey rang. "Dang! went the bell and the lady hearkened, once, twice, thrice, and her tears sprang forth. ' 'Twas three of the clock when I was wedded,' quoth she, ' in the castle to the North.' " ' They praised us for a comely couple, in truth my Lord was a sight to see, I gave him my troth for a golden dowry, and he gave me this ring on the stroke of three. " ' Three years I lived with him fair and stately, and then we quarrelled, as lovers will. He swore I wed for his golden dowry, and I that he loved another still. " ' I knew right well that never another had crossed the heart of my Dearest Lord, [ 76 ] THE RING AND THE CASTLE But still my rage waxed hot within me until, one morning, I fled abroad. ' ' All down the flickering isles of the forest I rode till at twilight I sat me down. And there a-weeping you found and took me, as one lifts a leaf which the wind has blown. ' ' But to-night my ring burns hot on my finger, and my Lord's face shines through the curtained door. And the bells beat heavy against my temples, two long strokes, and one stroke more. ' ' Loose me now, for your touch is terror, my heart is a hollow, my arms are wind; I must go out once more and wander, seeking the forest for what I shall find.' ' Then I fell upon her and stifled her speaking till the bells died away in the rustling breeze, [ 77 ] AMY LOWELL And so I held her dumb until morning with smoth- ered lips, but I knew no ease. " And every night that the bells came clearly, striking three strokes, like a heavy stone, I would seal her lips, but even as I kissed her, be- hind her clenched teeth I could hear her moan. " The nights grew longer, I had the lady, her pale blue veins and her skin of milk. But I might have been clasping a white wax image straightly stretched on a quilt of silk. " Then curdled anger foamed within me, and I tore at her finger to take the ring, The red gold ring which burned her spirit like some bewitched, unhallowed thing. " High in the boughs of our leafy chamber, the lady's sorrowing died away. [ 78 ] THE RING AND THE CASTLE All night I fought for the red gold circle, all night, till the oak trees reddened to day. " For two nights more I strove to take it, the red gold circlet, the ring of fear, But on the third in a blood-red vision I drew my sword and cut it clear. " Severed the ring and severed the finger, and slew my Dear on the stroke of three; Then I dug a grave beneath the oak trees, and buried her there where none could see. " I took the ring, and the bleeding finger, and sent a messenger swiftly forth. An amazing gift to my Lord I sent them, in his lonely castle to the North. " He died, they say, at the sight of my present, I laughed when I heard it — 'Hee! Hee! Hee! ' [ 79 ] AMY LOWELL But every night my veins run water and my pores sweat blood at the stroke of three." " Benjamin Bailey, Benjamin Bailey, seek repentance, your time is past." " My Dearest Dear lies under the oak-trees, pity indeed that the ring held fast." "Benjamin Bailey, Benjamin Bailey, sinners repent when they come to die." " Toll the bell in the Abbey tower, and under the oak- trees let me lie." [80] SHORE GRASS AMY LOWELL The moon is cold over the sand-dunes, And the clumps of sea-grasses flow and glitter; The thin chime of my watch tells the quarter after midnight; And still I hear nothing But the windy beating of the sea. [81] SMELLS CHRISTOPHER MORLEY Why is it that the poets tell So little of the sense of smell? These are the odours I love well: The smell of coffee freshly ground; Or rich plum pudding, holly crowned; Or onions fried and deeply browned. The fragrance of a fumy pipe; The smell of apples, newly ripe; And printers' ink on leaden type. Woods by moonlight in September Breathe most sweet; and I remember Many a smoky camp-fire ember. Camphor, turpentine, and tea, The balsam of a Christmas tree, These are whiffs of gramarye. . . . A ship smells best of all to me! [ 82 ] AN APRIL SEQUENCE EDWARD J. O'BRIEN I Premonition Where does the wind from the wilding blow Troubling the dream-caught woods of dawn With hushed remembrance of woven music Out of the shadowy gates of horn? Under the still-fringed water-meadows Colour is veining the grassy ways. Over the dove-clad clouds of winter A lark's cry falls through the ringing haze. Wind and water and star-paled heaven Mingle in colour and whisper of wind. Earth and air call unto the Father. Can April wonder be far behind? [83 ] EDWARD J. O'BRIEN II Tiding When all the tides of April Are rising in the air, And flowing grass and cloud And sea are fair. Light circles in the flower And flesh and foam, And body unto body Now turns home, While He whom, clad in colour And dream and prayer. Light heralds, rises naked, And white, and fair. Ill That skylark curving toward the south And circling idly up the wind, [ 84 ] AN APRIL SEQUENCE Unmindful of the winter's way, Leaves melody behind. Proclaiming through his arch of gold From heaven high to earth's deep, The wind that blows the stars to flame Cradles flowers in their sleep. IV April Flame Wind of the foaming air. Ripple over my heart. With April flame bend low. Of mine a part. Flower of the western sky. Blow in my flesh, With April laughter mine. Caught in my mesh. [85 ] EDWARD J. O'BRIEN Stars of the budding night, Shine on my brow: Make of these smouldering fires White wisdom now ! V Why grieve to see the light in air, Or sigh, of April fain? White orchards all afoam with stars Shall flower the dreaming plain. For spring comes white with morning, And laughs the clouds away. Why grieve that April flame is fled? Arise, and shout with May! [86] IN LATE SPRING CHARLES L. O'dONNELL I mark me how to-day the maples wear A look of inward burgeoning and I feel Colours I see not in the naked air, Lance-keen, and with the little blue of steel. No bud is forth nor green abroad and yet Air seems to wait with raiment for earth's flowers; Come, then, ungarmented, thou violet, And take thy purple of the tiring hours. [87] EXILES VINCENT O'SULLIVAN The sick crusader watches Through the window the fall of snow; She stands under the palm-trees watching The slow black caravans go. She sees him by the window watching The vacant snow-flakes fall ; He sees her in the hot sun standing Sorrowful, white, and tall. She hears him through the snow telling her All in his heart to tell — Beneath the moveless palm-trees In the dead glare at the well. [ 88 ] FAR UP IN THE MYSTERY HILLS VINCENT O'SULLIVAN Far up in the Mystery Hills Lies hid the little stone, And I must climb the Mystery Hills On the grey day, alone. Under the aching sky at noon Blows a vast wind and cries Dead hours and their solemnities: Ah, they were still and wise. And is it this, the little stone? Oh, my poor brother, see The broken things, the broken things, That will not let me be. [89 ] HE SINGS BECAUSE HIS WIFE HAS GONE OUT OF THE HOUSE VINCENT O'SULLIVAN He sings because his wife has gone out of the house: Bending over the table in the twilight of the room He sings soft old things he sang when he was a boy, And near his chair stays listening a grey mouse. He sings because the gay loud woman is out in the town, And in his heart there is a quiet, and the room is so still That the grey mouse preens its whiskers far away from the wall, For the man's voice is dreamy and kind like those who are very ill. And he wonders if some day his wife will go out of the house And leave him alone with the mouse, too still to feel more [ 90 ] HE SINGS Than the waves and the waves of quiet in the dark- ened room, As he lies with the sun on his face through a chink of the door. [91 ] RAINY DAY VINCENT O'SULUVAN The patient rain falls in a hush On the poor little town; All night long it fell on the street Where the leaves lie dead and brown. The drug-store shines with wet, And behind the glass panes stare The pale eyes of the palsied woman Who lives by her kind son's care. Nobody goes out at all; But the little ships at sea Sail wisely through the mist of rain And this night they will be Rocking at the wharves Of the poor little town, And the strong captains shouting Ho! Ho! After the sails come down. [92 ] DEFEAT WILLIAM ALEXANDER PERCY Though you have struck me to the bloody core, It is indeed only one scar the more! And I'll not turn from you as at the other strokes, Nor say " Good-bye! " as other times I said. The agony still chokes, And still it seems most restful to be dead. But I'll not say " Good-bye " nor turn away Nor parting lover play. . . . Leave you? Take everything save all — my heart? I know the scene too well, too well my part! Hot tears and bitterness; and I would go. Go for an hour, a day, a week — Is bitterness so short called pique? And in the old, old way without regret I would return to you; And in the old, old way you would forget That ever I had gone, and let Some casual tenderness [ 93 ] WILLIAM ALEXANDER PERCY Be my return's caress; Or, in some vague, absorbed distress. Lift up your shadow eyes to mine, still wet [94] TO BUTTERFLY WILLIAM ALEXANDER PERCY Do you remember how the twilight stood And leaned above the river just to see If still the crocus buds were in her hood, And if her robes were gold or shadowy? Do you remember how the twilight stood When we were lovers and the world our wood? And then, one night, when we could find no word. But silence trembled like a heart — like mine ! — And suddenly that moon-enraptured bird Awoke and all the darkness turned to wine? How long ago that was ! And how absurd For us to own a wood that owned a bird! They tell me there are magic gardens still, And birds that sleep to wake and dream to sing. And streams that pause for crocus skies to fill; But they that told were lovers and 'twas spring. Yet why the moon to-night's a daffodil When it is March — Do you remember, still? [ 95 ] CHLOE TO AMARYLLIS LIZETTE WOODWORTH REESE That you are poor, that I grow old, It matters not. Our battles hold. The lovely, undisturbed things Are left for our rememberings. Kings' houses; graves out on the downs; Shop windows in great ancient towns; The rooks tossed up the rosy sky Out of the vicarage garden high; The minster tower poignant with years That shook the dusk as though with tears. Scraps of old music dewy-clear Haimt us each turning of the year; When fields are coloured like a stone, A thought of April can atone; Of cowslip flowers golden small Under a windy village wall. [ 96 ] CHLOE TO AMARYLLIS That you are poor, and I grow old ! But memories keep ; but battles hold : — The footspace snatched from quaking mire; From dying dreams the undying fire; And when we trod the perilous land, The god all ready to our hand. [ 97 GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA edwin arlington robinson Genevieve Don't look at me so much as if to-day Were the last day on earth for both of us! Alexandra Now for the love of heaven, dear Genevieve, And for your love of me, and I'm your sister. Say why it is that since I found this house That all-mysterious little tongue of yours. Which God gave you to talk with and so tell Bewildered sisters and impatient friends Whatever 'tis that ails you, tells me nothing. You sent for me as if the world were dying All roimd you, quite as mice do that are poisoned. And here I am; and I'll be dying soon, Of common ordinary desperation. Unless you tell me more now in an hour Than you have had me guessing in a fortnight. [98 ] GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA Genevieve Dear child, have you no eyes? Alexandra Two, Genevieve; But they were never sharp enough to find A way to make the man who married you See more in me than in six hundred others. I would have given half my fingers then To make him look at me as if he saw me; But it was you he saw, and you seemed frightened. I wish the creature might have cared enough To frighten me! But I was just a thing With skirts and arms and legs and ears and hair, Like all of us he saw — till he saw you. You know it, and I say it. That's all over. Genevieve My God, there's no beginning to some things. Or I could speak. For two weeks I have waited [99 ] EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON For you to make it easy to be hard; And yet you tell me now that you have eyes! Did you have eyes last night? Alexandra Genevieve I thought so. Yes? Alexandra You are coming then to something after all; And that's a boon. But all you say, my dear, Is not quite all you mean. You don't mean Her? Genevieve I counted on you to find words where I Find silence. Was that too ridiculous? Alexandra You counted on my old unpleasant way Of saying out what you find odious? I understand, and I'll be generous. [ 100 ] GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA I'm old enough, the good Lord knows, who gave me A feature less than what I might have used Of beauty, and you more than you can use; Or so it seems. The good Lord's ways are past Our delving, and we've each a book to read — A book that has a leaf we'll not lay open Till Time's old skinny finger does it for us. It's all a game, and one Time plays with women Who cannot meet the Lord half way. That's you, My angel. There'll be something done about it; Or there'll be waiting till Time wins again, And then 'twill all be groaning, and too late. For Time has had an eye on even you. These years together. Don't forget old sayings. For they are true and they have not much mercy. Genevieve And what's this you are saying of old sayings? It's not the old that I want now, but the new. [101] EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON I've had enough that's old. I've had enough — Day after day of it. Do I look old? Alexandra Not yet; you needn't fret. But even at that There's time enough to tear the calendar When days are dead. Genevieve She's older than I am. Alexandra She knows, my dear. Genevieve She knows it, and he knows it! Alexandra But that's not all she knows, nor all he knows. Genevieve What are you saying now ? What do you mean ? [ 102 ] GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA Alexandra I'm saying something new. Lord save us all; I'm saying something new. You cried aloud For me to do it, and you only ask, "What are you saying now! " I'm saying this: I'm saying there are men to take your gift Of pride and ice and fear of being human, And, having it, be happy all their days; I'm saying also that the man you married Is not a cave-man, or a cannibal Who means to eat you pretty soon, — although An alabaster shrine with now and then A taper burning low, or going out. Is not what he calls home or good religion. He calls it something else, and something worse. I'm sorry, but he does. Genevieve And you defend him. [ 103 ] EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON Alexandra Defence and understanding, as I know them, Are not of a necessity the same. Genevieve How do you know so much? Alexandra I don't know much; I know a little. I wish you knew a little. Genevieve I wish you knew a little more. Alexandra Genevieve Well, if I am, what of it? I am not The only woman who has ever cried. I'm not the only woman, I dare say, [ 104 ] You're crying! GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA Who's in a cage, beating on iron bars That even other women cannot see. Alexandra Surely I see them — with a difference. Genevieve How good of you to see them! Alexandra Say no more, My dear, until you are yourself again. You tell of cages and of iron bars. And there are bars, I grant you: bars enough, But they are not of iron. Do you think Because a man — a rather furry man Who likes a woman with a dash of Eve To liven her insensible perfection — Looks now and then the other way, that you Are cribbed in iron for the blessed length Of all your silly days? Why don't you like [ 105 ] EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON To see, with your magnificent sad eyes, How much, and yet how little, you may do To send that other one to Jericho, Or some place else? I wish I had your face! If so, you might be free now, as I am; Free as a bird, and one without a cage. Lord, so free, so free! Some day or other. When I'm at home, I'm going to throw a brick At that superb tall monstrous Ching-Chang vase In the front room which every one admires. There'll be a noise, and that will make a change, If nothing else. You made a change; and all You get of it's a reason to be jealous. Lord love us, you'll be jealous next of me. Because your condescending spouse made out Somehow to scratch my cheek with his hard whiskers, To honour my arrival. He might as well Have done it with a broom, and I've a guess Would rather. [ 106 ] GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA Genevieve I can only say again, I wish you knew a little more. Alexandra I wish You fancied not so much. Genevieve Oh, is it fancy? Alexandra Whatever it is, you've made it what it is. I know the man; he wants his house to live in. He's not the kind who makes another man's Romance a nightmare for the humour of it; He's not one to go leering everywhere As if he were a spider with an income; He's what he is; and you that have him so, I see, are in the best of ways to lose him. [ 107 ] EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON But who am I, to talk of him? You made me, And you'll remember that. Now that's all over. Genevieve You pat me as you would a little dog. Bow-wow ! Alexandra Genevieve I wish you knew a little more. Alexandra My darling, you have honoured me three times By wishing that identical sweet wish; And if in all agreement with your text I say as much myself and say it louder. You'll treasure to my credit, when I'm dead, One faint remembrance of humility. Although I don't think you are listening, I'm saying I'm an insect. Do you hear me? Lord, what a sigh! [ 108 ] GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA Genevieve I hear you. Yes, I hear you. And what you seem to say so easily May be the end of wisdom, possibly. And I may change. I don't believe it much, But I may change a little. I don't know. It may be now that I don't care enough To change. It may be that the few lights left Around the shrine, as you say, may go out Without my tending them or seeing them. It seems a jealous love is not enough To bring at once to light, as I have seen it, The farthest hidden of all mockeries That home can hold and hide — until it comes. Well, it has come. Oh, never mind me now! Our tears are cheap, and men see few of them. He doesn't know that I know. Alexandra Genevieve ! [ 109 ] EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON Say something, if you only say you hate me. What have I done? Have I done anything? It isn't what I said? I knew it wasn't. Poor child, I cannot ask if you are right, Or say that you are wrong, until I know The growing of all this. Whatever word You tell me now, although you find it hard — And life has nothing harder than small words That may not say themselves and be forgotten — May prove at last, or soon, or even to-day. The one beginning of deliverance. No more then. I'll not sting you for an answer. Indeed, I may be wrong; and it may be That you are not my sister any more. Genevieve The farthest hidden things are still, my dear. They make no noise; and we, in our poor turn. Say less of them than of the common spite We nourish for the friend who loves too much. [ 110 ] GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA They come from where they live, like slender snakes, And strike us in the dark; and then we suffer. And you, my sister, of all women living. Have made me know the truth of what I'm saying; And you, as I'm a fool, know nothing more Than what I've hardly said. Thank God for that. Alexandra Why mock yourself with more unhappy names Than sorrow shares with reason? Why defeat The one safe impulse and the one sure need That now are on their way to lay for ever The last of all the bogeys you have seen Somewhere in awful corners that are dark Because you make them so and keep them so? You like the dark, maybe. I don't. I hate it. Now tell me what it is you've hardly said; For I assure you that you've hardly said it. [ 111 ] EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON Genevieve You make a jest of love and all it means. I can bear that. The world has always done it, The world has always borne it. Many men And women have made laughter out of those Who might as well have been in hell as here, Alive and listening. When love can hold Its own with change, no more, 'twere better then For love to die. Indeed, there might be then, If that were all, an easy death for love; If not, then for the woman. Alexandra If that were all? You speak now as if that were not enough. Genevieve It seems it isn't. There's another comer; And in that corner there's another ghost. [ 112 ] GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA Alexandra What have I done? Have I done anything? Genevieve Yes, you have made me see how poor I am; How futile, and how far away I am From what his hungry love and hungry mind Thought I was giving when I gave myself. Alexandra But when his eyes are on you, I can swear That I see only kindness in his face. Genevieve I'll send you home if you say that again. Alexandra Be tranquil ; I shall not say that again. But tell me more about his hungry mind — I understand the rest of it. Good Lord! I never knew he had a himgry mind. [ 113 ] EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON Genevieve He hasn't one when you are with him. Alexandra What! Genevieve I say he hasn't one when you are with him. You feed him. You can talk of what he knows And cares about. Six months have been enough To make what little mind I ever had A weariness too blank for his endurance. He knows how little I shall ever know,^ He knows that in his measure I'm a fool; And there is only — kindness in his face, You tell me now. I'd rather be his dog. Alexandra What in the name of ruin, dear Genevieve, Do you think you are doing now with words? [ 114 ] GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA Genevieve I'd rather be a byword in the city, And let him have his harem and be happy ; I'd rather live in hovels and eat scraps, And feed the pigs and all the wretched babies; I'd rather steal my food or starve to death; I'd rather cut my feet off and take poison; I'd rather sit and skin myself alive Than be a fool ! I'd rather be a toad Than live to see that — kindness in his face! Alexandra Poor Genevieve, that wasn't you! Your nerves Are talking, and they don't know what they're saying. Don't think that you alone of womankind Have had these little fancies. Genevieve Oh, stop that! C 115 ] DRUMNOTES CARL SANDBURG Days of the dead men, Danny. Drum for the dead, drum on your remembering heart. Jaures, a great love-heart of France, a slug of lead in the red valves. Kitchener of Khartoum, tall, cold, proud, a shark's mouthful. Franz Josef, the old man of forty haunted kingdoms, in a tomb with the Hapsburg fathers, moths eating a green uniform to tatters, worms taking all and leaving only bones and gold buttons, bones and iron crosses. Jack London, Jim Riley, Verhaeren, riders to the republic of dreams. Days of the dead, Danny. Drum on your remembering heart. [ 116 ] AN OLD INN BY THE SEA^ ODELL SHEPARD All night long we had heard the voice of the Sea Roaming the corridors. Across the worn and hollow floors There went a ghostly tread incessantly. The walls of our old inn, By windy winters eaten grey and thin, Trembled and shook, the wild night long. With resonant, vague, hoarse-throated song Like a storm-strung violin. All night we heard vast forces throng To onset in the dark, indomitably strong. An army imder sable banners flying. And then, above the din Of far wild voices crying And farther, wilder voices dreadfully replying. Slowly, far down the unseen mysterious shore, 1 Written shortly after America's declaration of war. [ 117 ] ODELL SHEPARD With fearful sibilance and long xinintermittent roar, We heard another, mightier tide begin! Then our hearts shook, there on the world's wild rim Fronting eternity and neighbouring the Abyss. Had we not cowered all night from the face of Him, The King of Terrors, from the coil and hiss Of the pale snakes of death Writhing about our very door? Had we not borne his clammy breath Upon our hair Nightlong, and his stealthy footstep on the stair, His vast voice everywhere? Had not each echoing wall and hollow floor, Worn by his winds so grey and spectre-thin. Resounded like the shell of a fragile violin That screams once at its death and never more? Had He not homage of our fear enough before He sent this last dark cohort crashing in? [ 118 ] THE FLOCK AT EVENING ODELL SHEPARD Down from the rocky western steep Where now the sunset crumbles low The shepherd draws his sim-drowsed sheep Ringed in a rosy glow; Along the dusty leaf-hung lane, Now blurred in shade, now bright again, They trail in splendour, aureoled And mystical in clouded gold. As insubstantial as a dream They huddled homeward by my door, — From what Theocritean stream Or what Thessalian shore? What ancient air surrounds them still, As though from some Arcadian hill They shuffled through the afterglow Across the fields of long ago? [ 119 ] ODELL SHEPARD Is this the flock that Bion kept From straying by his reed-soft tunes While the long ilex shadow crept Through ancient afternoons? In some still Arethusan wood, Ages agone, have they not stood Wondering, circle-wise and mute, Round some remote Sicilian flute? I think that they have gazed across The dazzle of Ionian seas From the green capes of Tenedos Or sea-washed Cyclades, And loitered through the twilight down The hills that gird some Attic town Still shining in the early gloam Beside the murmur of the foam. What dream is this? I know the croft, Deep in this dale, where they were bom; [ 120] A FLOCK AT EVENING I know their wind-swept hills aloft Among the rustling corn; Yet, while they glimmer slowly by, A younger earth, a fairer sky Seem round them, and they move sublime Among the morning dews of time. [121] THE FIRST FOOD GEORGE STERLING Mother, in some sad evening long ago, From thy yomig breast my groping lips were taken, Their hunger stilled, so soon again to waken, But nevermore that holy food to know. Ah! nevermore! for all the child might crave! Ah! nevermore! through years unkind and dreary! Often of other fare my lips are weary, Unwearied once of what thy bosom gave. (Poor wordless mouth that could not speak thy name! At what unhappy revels has it eaten The viands that no memory can sweeten, — The banquet found eternally the same!) Then fell a shadow first on thee and me. And tendrils broke that held us two how dearly! Once infinitely thine, then hourly, yearly, Less thine, as less the worthy thine to be! [ 122 ] THE FIRST FOOD (0 mouth that yet should kiss the mouth of Sin! Were lies so' sweet, now bitter to remember? Slow sinks the flame unfaithful to an ember; New beauty fades and passion's wine is thin.) How poor an end of that solicitude And all the love I had not from another! Peace to thine unforgetting heart, Mother, Who gav'st the dear and unremembered food! [ 123] LLEWELLYN, PRINCE OF CAMBRIA A Welsh Ballad CHARLES WHARTON STORK Llewellyn stood at his palace door, And a frown was on his face. " Farewell," he cried to his new-wed bride, "Farewell for a little space! " Sith you deny me a dole of love For the gift of my princely name, I'm forth to seek me a love that will, Though it be a love of shame." Llewellyn he turned from his palace gate. Went over the hills away; He ate of the deer, he drank of the stream For many a livelong day. Llewellyn rose from his bed of leaves One morn when the mists were red, [ 124] LLEWELLYN, PRINCE OF CAMBRIA And he was aware of a woman's form Stood high on a cliff o'erhead. This woman was clad in the dun deer-skin, But one white breast was bare, And kilted was she above the knee, And loose was her red-gold hair. The sun rose behind her out of the east. And she glowed like a flame of fire, And she stretched her arms toward Llewellyn there Till he trembled with sweet desire. Then up leapt he right wantonly And ran to where she stood. But she waved her hand, and turned and fled Through the dark of the tangled wood. The woman ran and Llewellyn ran Through bush and meadow and brake, [ 125 ] CHARLES WHARTON STORK O'er many a craggy mountain-ridge, Round many a quiet lake. And twice when Llewellyn stopped to breathe In the heat of the breathless noon The woman turned and looked at him Till his strong heart reeled in a swoon. They ran all day and they ran at eve By the light of the first wan star, For Llewellyn followed her red-gold hair That gleamed in the dusk afar. They came at length to a narrow glen Where the cliff rose sheer o'erhead. The woman she sank in a huddled heap And hid her face as in dread. Llewellyn came up and looked at her While her panting shoulders heaved, [ 126 ] LLEWELLYN, PRINCE OF CAMBRIA He heard the sob of her deep-drawn breath, And his heart was well-nigh grieved. " prize that the speed of my feet hath won, Come yield with a right good grace! You wakened my love, you may still my love.- Turn round and show your face! " She answered him, and her voice was low, But welcome unto his ear; " What vow will you vow if I turn to you, For my bosom is faint with fear. " If you would have me to show my face And yield to you frank and free, You must pass your troth you will never bed With woman unless with me. " If you would master a woman's love. You must yield to a woman's pride, [ 127 ] CHARLES WHARTON STORK For I have a knife within my hand That else will pierce my side." Llewellyn raised the cross of his glaive And a mighty vow made he: " Be God my help as I keep this troth, If you will but yield to me! " The woman laughed with a bitter laugh: "A mighty oath you make; But you vowed as deep to your wedded wife, And now that vow you would break." " If I vowed as deep to my wedded wife, 'Twas my father that bade me to ; But now I have won a bride of my own, And my vow to her is true." She has turned her round, she has shown her face On the greensward where she lay; [ 128 ] LLEWELLYN, PRINCE OF CAMBRIA And he has kneeled him to look on her, For the evening light was grey. He has seen the eyes of his own sweet wife, He has seen her red mouth smile. He has bowed his head to the dewy grass And cried, " Woe worth the while ! " For I am shamed that I did not know The fairest woman alive. But treated her ill and spoke her harsh Because I was forced to wive." She has drawn his body into her arms, Has kissed him on cheek and brow; " Sith you have won a bride of your own, Be faithful to your vow." " What made you refuse my love before, If now you love me so? And why did you stain your black, black hair A hue that I could not know? " [ 129 ] CHARLES WHARTON STORK " Oh the love of yours I refused before Was a love a woman would scorn, For the love of yours I refused before Was a love whence hate is born. " And I did stain my black, black hair And put off my robes of pride That you might strive as never you strove Ere you won me for your bride. " For the love that falls like fruit from the tree Will lightly be thrown away, But the love that is bought with a man's whole strength Will haply last for aye." She drew his breast to her bosom then. His lips unto hers she drew; " You have vowed your vow, you have won me now. And I will yield to you." [ 130 ] AT MIDNIGHT SARA TEASDALE Now at last I have come to see what life is, Nothing is ever ended, everything only begun, And the brave victories that seem so splendid Are never really won. Even love, that I built my spirit's house for, Comes like a baffled and a brooding guest. And art and fame and love and even laughter Are not so good as rest. [131] THE EMBERS SPEAK THOMAS WALSH I was the acorn that fell From the autumn bough In the warm earth to dwell; I grew to a branch somehow; And I waved in the nightly storm, And sheltered the kine When the hills were yellow and warm With the noon divine. I, too, 'mid the sheathing moss Felt the ax's blow, And fell, with a thunderous loss Of the stars I know And the clouds that sift no more Through my shattered limbs; Save where the hearthstones roar And the dying ember dims. [ 132 ] LAGGARD MARGARET WIDDEMER My mind is very swift and gay; She flutters to and fro, She knows a thousand things to play, A thousand roads to go ; But oh, my heart will never play — She sits and watches still A stone she saw them set one day Beside a low green hill. [ 133 ] jpl,S|iiii,l||,i!>li!;lljl|S.iil,!,:ii|i|i|ii.;i||;i, lir m\it 3 i';,i "::^' itirr