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C^nrneU Untttcrattg iCihtarg 
 
 FROM THE 
 
 BENNO LOEWY LIBRARY 
 
 COLLECTED BY 
 
 BENNO LOEWY 
 
 1854-1919 
 BEQUEATHED TO CORNELL UNIVERSITY 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PS 1024.U6 1895 
 
 Unguarded gates and other poems / 
 
 3 1924 022 153 864 
 
The original of tliis bool< is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022153864 
 
^oo&ci bp d)amae ^ailep 9ll1in'c|b> 
 
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 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & COMPANY, 
 Boston and New York. 
 
POEMS 
 
UNGUARDED GATES 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 THOMAS BAILEY /.LDRICH 
 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 
 
 189s 
 
 ^'i 
 
Copyright, 1894 / 
 
 Bv THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
 The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U.S.A. 
 Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton & Ca 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Prelude ......... 7 
 
 Unguarded Gates 13 
 
 Elmwood 18 
 
 A Shadow of the Night 25 
 
 Sea Longings 28 
 
 The Lament of El Moulok 31 
 
 Necromancy . . 34 
 
 White Edith 35 
 
 Interludes — 
 
 Insomnia ........ 49 
 
 Seeming Defeat 52 
 
 Two Moods 54 
 
 A Parable 57 
 
 " Great Captain, glorious in our Wars " . .58 
 
 A Refrain 60 
 
 At Nijnii-Novgorod 61 
 
 The Winter Robin 64 
 
 The Sailing of the Autocrat . . . .65 
 
 Cradle Song 68 
 
 Broken Music .69 
 
 Art 72 
 
6 CONTENTS 
 
 Interludes — 
 
 "When from the tense chords of that mighty 
 
 lyre" 74 
 
 A Serenade ,76 
 
 A Bridal Measure 78 
 
 Imogen 80 
 
 Seven Sonnets — 
 
 Outward Bound 85 
 
 Ellen Terry in " The Merchant of Venice " . .87 
 
 The Poets ... .... 89 
 
 The Undiscovered Country 91 
 
 Books and Seasons 93 
 
 Reminiscence 95 
 
 Andromeda -97 
 
 nourmadee 99 
 
 Footnotes — 
 
 Fireflies 117 
 
 Problem 117 
 
 Originality . , . .... 118 
 
 Kismet 118 
 
 A Hint from Herrick 119 
 
 Pessimistic Poets 119 
 
 Hospitality 120 
 
 Points of View 120 
 
 The Two Masks 121 
 
 Quits 121 
 
PRELUDE 
 
PRELUDE 
 
 In youth, beside the lonely sea, 
 Voices and visions came to me. 
 
 Titania and her furtive broods 
 Were my familiars in the woods. 
 
 From every flower that broke in flame, 
 Some half-articulate whisper came. 
 
 In every wind I felt the stir 
 Of some celestial messenger. 
 
O PRELUDE 
 
 Later, amid the city's din 
 
 And toil and wealth and want and sin, 
 
 They followed me from street to street, 
 The dreams that made my boyhood sweet. 
 
 As in the silence-haunted glen, 
 So, mid the crowded ways of men, 
 
 Strange lights my errant fancy led. 
 Strange watchers watched beside my bed. 
 
 Ill fortune had no shafts for me 
 In this aerial company. 
 
 Now one by one the visions fly. 
 And one by one the voices die. 
 
PRELUDE 
 
 More distantly the accents ring, 
 More frequent the receding wing. 
 
 Full dark shall be the days in store, 
 When voice and vision come no more \ 
 
UNGUARDED GATES 
 
UNGUARDED GATES 
 
 Wide open and unguarded stand our gates, 
 Named of the four winds, North, South, East, and 
 
 West; 
 Portals that lead to an enchanted land 
 Of cities, forests, fields of living gold. 
 Vast prairies, lordly summits touched with snow, 
 Majestic rivers sweeping proudly past 
 The Arab's date-palm and the Norseman's 
 
 pine — 
 A realm wherein are fruits of every zone, 
 Airs of all climesJ for lo ! throughout the year 
 The red rose blossoms somewhere — a rich land. 
 
l6 UNGUARDED GATES 
 
 A later Eden planted in the wilds, 
 
 With not an inch of earth within its bound 
 
 But if a slave's foot press it sets him free. 
 
 Here, it is written, Toil shall have its wage. 
 
 And Honor honor, and the humbleSt man 
 
 Stand level with the highest in the law. 
 
 Of such a land have men in dungeons dreamed, 
 
 And with the vision brightening in their eyes 
 
 Gone smiling to the fagot and the sword. 
 
 Wide open and unguarded stand our gates. 
 And through them presses a wild motley throng — 
 Men from the Volga and the Tartar steppes. 
 Featureless figures of the Hoang-Ho, 
 Malayan, Scythian, Teuton, Kelt, and Slav, 
 Flying the Old World's poverty and scorn ; 
 These bringing with them unknown gods and rites. 
 
UNGUARDED GATES 17 
 
 Those, tiger passions, here to stretch their claws. 
 In street and alley what strange tongues are loud, 
 Accents of menace alien to our air, 
 Voices that once the Tower of Babel knew ! 
 O Liberty, white Goddess ! is it well 
 To leave the gates unguarded ? On thy breast 
 Fold Sorrow's children, soothe the hurts of fate. 
 Lift the down-trodden, but with hand of steel 
 Stay those who to thy sacred portals come 
 To waste the gifts of freedom. Have a care 
 Lest from thy brow the clustered stars be torn i 
 And trampled in the dust. For so of old 
 The thronging Goth and Vandal trampled Rome, 
 And where the temples of the Caesars stood 
 The lean wolf unmolested made her lair. 
 
ELMWOOD 
 
 IN MEMORY OF JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 
 
 Here, in the twilight, at the well-known gate 
 I linger, with no heart to enter more. 
 Among the elm-tops the autumnal air 
 Murmurs, and spectral in the fading light 
 A solitary heron wings its way 
 Southward — save this no sound or touch of life. 
 Dark is that window where the scholar's lamp 
 Was used to catch a pallor from the dawn. 
 
 Yet I must needs a little linger here. 
 Each shrub and tree is eloquent of him, 
 
ELMWOOD 19 
 
 For tongueless things and silence have their | 
 
 speech. 
 This is the path familiar to his foot 
 From infancy to manhood and old age ; 
 For in a chamber of that ancient house 
 His eyes first opened on the mystery 
 Of life, and all the splendor of the world. 
 Here, as a child, in loving, curious way. 
 He watched the bluebird's coming ; learned the 
 
 date 
 Of hyacinth and goldenrod, and made 
 Friends of those little redmen of the elms. 
 And slyly added to their winter store 
 Of hazel-nuts : no harmless thing that breathed, 
 Footed or winged, but knew him for a friend. 
 The gilded butterfly was not afraid 
 To trust its gold to that so gentle hand, 
 
20 ELMWOOD 
 
 The bluebird fled not from the pendent spray. 
 Ah, happy childhood, ringed with fortunate stars ! 
 What dreams were his in this enchanted sphere. 
 What intuitions of high destiny ! 
 The honey-bees of Hybla touched his lips 
 In that old New- World garden, unawares. 
 
 So in her arms did Mother Nature fold 
 Her poet, whispering what of wild and sweet 
 Into his ear — the state-affairs of birds. 
 The lore of dawn and sunset, what the wind 
 Said in the tree-tops — fine, unfathomed things 
 Henceforth to turn to music in his brain : 
 A various music, now like notes of flutes. 
 And now like blasts of trumpets blown in wars. 
 Later he paced this leafy academe 
 A student, drinking from Greek chalices 
 
ELM WOOD 21 
 
 The ripened vintage of the antique world. 
 
 And here to him came love, and love's dear 
 
 loss; 
 Here honors came, the deep applause of men 
 Touched to the heart by some swift-winged word 
 That from his own full heart took eager flight — 
 Some strain of piercing sweetness or rebuke, 
 For underneath his gentle nature flamed 
 A noble scorn for all ignoble deed, 
 Himself a bondman till all men were free. 
 
 Thus passed his manhood ; then to other lands 
 He strayed, a stainless figure among courts 
 Beside the Manzanares and the Thames. 
 Whence, after too long exile, he returned 
 With fresher laurel, but sedater step 
 And eye more serious, fain to breathe the air 
 
22 ELMWOOD 
 
 Where through the Cambridge marshes the blue 
 
 Charles 
 Uncoils its length and stretches to the sea : 
 Stream dear to him, at every curve a shrine 
 For pilgrim Memory. Again he watched 
 His loved syringa whitening by the door, 
 And knew the catbird's welcome ; in his walks 
 Smiled on his tawny kinsmen of the elms 
 Stealing his nuts ; and in the ruined year 
 Sat at his widowed hearthside with bent brows 
 Leonine, frosty with the breath of time. 
 And listened to the crooning of the wind 
 In the wide Elmwood chimneys, as of old. 
 And then — and then . . . 
 
 The after-glow has faded from the elms, 
 And in the denser darkness of the boughs 
 
ELMWOOD 23 
 
 From time to time the firefly's tiny lamp 
 Sparkles. How often in still summer dusks 
 He paused to note that transient phantom spark 
 Flash on the air — a light that outlasts him ! 
 
 The night grows chill, as if it felt a breath 
 Blown from that frozen city where he lies. 
 All things turn strange. The leaf that rustles 
 
 here 
 Has more than autumn's mournfulness. The 
 
 place 
 Is heavy with his absence. Like fixed eyes 
 Whence the dear light of sense and thought has 
 
 fled 
 The vacant windows stare across the lawn. 
 The wise sweet spirit that informed it all 
 Is otherwhere. The house itself is dead. 
 
24 ELMWOOD 
 
 O autumn wind among the sombre pines, 
 Breathe you his dirge, but be it sweet and low, 
 With deep refrains and murmurs of the sea. 
 Like to his verse — the art is yours alone. 
 His once — you taught him. Now no voice but 
 
 yours ! 
 Tender and low, O wind among the pines. 
 I would, were mine a lyre of richer strings. 
 In soft Sicilian accents wrap his name. 
 
A SHADOW OF THE NIGHT 
 
 Close on the edge of a midsummer dawn 
 In troubled dreams I went from land to land, 
 Each seven-colored like the rainbow's arc, 
 Regions where never fancy's foot had trod 
 Till then ; yet all the strangeness seemed not 
 
 strange. 
 At which I wondered, reasoning in my dream 
 With two-fold sense, well knowing that I slept. 
 At last I came to this our cloud-hung earth. 
 And somewhere by the seashore was a grave, 
 A woman's grave, new-made, and heaped with 
 
 flowers ; 
 
26 A SIfADOW OF THE NIGHT 
 
 And near it stood an ancient holy man 
 That fain would comfort me, who sorrowed not 
 For this unknown dead woman at my feet. 
 But I, because his sacred ofi&ce held 
 My reverence, listened ; and 't was thus he spake : 
 " When next thou comest thou shalt find her still 
 In all the rare perfection that she was. 
 Thou shalt have gentle greeting of thy love ! 
 Her eyelids will have turned to violets. 
 Her bosom to white lilies, and her breath 
 To roses. What is lovely never dies, 
 But passes into other loveliness, 
 Star-dust, or sea-foam, flower, or winged air. 
 If this befalls our poor unworthy flesh, 
 Think thee what destiny awaits the soul ! 
 What glorious vesture it shall wear at last ! " 
 While yet he spoke, seashore and grave and 
 priest 
 
A SHADOW OF THE NIGHT 27 
 
 Vanished, and faintly from a neighboring spire 
 
 Fell five slow solemn strokes upon my ear. 
 
 Then I awoke with a keen pain at heart, 
 
 A sense of swift unutterable loss. 
 
 And through the darkness reached my hand to 
 
 touch 
 Her cheek, soft-pillowed on one restful palm — 
 To be quite sure ! 
 
SEA LONGINGS 
 
 The first world-sound that fell upon my ear 
 Was that of the great winds along the coast 
 Crushing the deep-sea beryl on the rocks — 
 The distant breakers' sullen cannonade. 
 Against the spires and gables of the town 
 The white fog drifted, catching here and there 
 At over-leaning cornice or peaked roof, 
 And hung — weird gonfalons. The garden walks 
 Were choked with leaves, and on their ragged 
 
 biers 
 Lay dead the sweets of summer — damask rose, 
 Clove-pink, old-fashioned, loved New England 
 
 flowers. 
 
SEA LONGINGS 29 
 
 Only keen salt sea-odors filled the air. 
 
 Sea-sounds, sea-odors — these were all my world. 
 
 Hence is it that life languishes with me 
 
 Inland ; the valleys stifle me with gloom 
 
 And pent-up prospect ; in their narrow bound 
 
 Imagination flutters futile wings. 
 
 Vainly I seek the sloping pearl-white sand 
 
 And the mirage's phantom citadels 
 
 Miraculous, a moment seen, then gone. 
 
 Among the mountains I am ill at ease. 
 
 Missing the stretched horizon's level line 
 
 And the illimitable restless blue. 
 
 The crag-torn sky is not the sky I love. 
 
 But one unbroken sapphire spanning all ; 
 
 And nobler than the branches of a pine 
 
 Aslant upon a precipice's edge 
 
 Are the strained spars of some great battle-ship 
 
30 SEA LONGINGS 
 
 Plowing across the sunset. No bird's lilt 
 
 So takes me as the whistling of the gale 
 
 Among the shrouds. My cradle-song was this, 
 
 Strange inarticulate sorrows of the sea, 
 
 Blithe rhythms upgathered from the Sirens' caves. 
 
 Perchance of earthly voices the last voice 
 
 That shall an instant my freed spirit stay 
 
 On this world's verge, will be some message 
 
 blown 
 Over the dim salt lands that fringe the coast 
 At dusk, or when the tranced midnight droops 
 With weight of stars, or haply just as dawn. 
 Illumining the sullen purple wave. 
 Turns the gray pools and willow-stems to gold. 
 
THE LAMENT OF EL MOULOK 
 
 Within the sacred precincts of the mosque, 
 Even on the very steps of St. Sophia, 
 He lifted up his voice and spoke these words, 
 El Moulok, who sang naught but love-songs once, 
 And now was crazed because his son was dead : 
 
 O ye who leave 
 
 Your slippers at the portal, as is meet, 
 
 Give heed an instant ere ye bow in prayer. 
 
 Ages ago, 
 
 Allah, grown weary of His myriad worlds, 
 Would one star more to hang against the blue. 
 
32 THE LAMENT OF EL MOULOK 
 
 Then of men's bones, 
 
 Millions on millions, did He build the earth. 
 
 Of women's tears, 
 
 Down falling through the night. He made the sea. 
 
 Of sighs and sobs 
 
 He made the winds that surge about the globe. 
 
 Where'er ye tread, 
 
 Ye tread on dust that once was living man. 
 
 The mist and rain 
 
 Are tears that first from human eyelids fell. 
 
 The unseen winds 
 
 Breathe endless lamentation for the dead. 
 
THE LAMENT OF EL MOULOK 33 
 
 Not SO the ancient tablets told the tale, 
 Not so the Koran ! This was blasphemy, 
 And they that heard El Moulok dragged him 
 
 hence, 
 Even from the very steps of St. Sophia, 
 And loaded him with triple chains of steel, 
 And cast him in a dungeon. 
 
 None the less 
 Do women's tears fall ceaseless day and night. 
 And none the less do mortals faint and die 
 And turn to dust ; and every wind that blows 
 About the globe seems heavy with the grief 
 Of those who sorrow, or have sorrowed, here. 
 Yet none the less is Allah the Most High, 
 The Clement, the Compassionate. He sees 
 Where we are blind, and hallowed be His Name ! 
 
NECROMANCY 
 
 Through a chance fissure of the churchyard 
 
 wall 
 A creeping vine puts forth a single spray, 
 At whose slim end a starry blossom droops 
 Full to the soft vermilion of a rose 
 That reaches up on tiptoe for the kiss. 
 Not them the wren disturbs, nor the loud bee 
 That buzzes homeward with his load of sweets : 
 And thus they linger, flowery lip to lip. 
 Heedless of all, in rapturous mute embrace. 
 Some necromancy here ! These two, I think, 
 Were once unhappy lovers upon earth. 
 
WHITE EDITH 
 
 Abovk an ancient book, with a knight's crest 
 In tarnished gold on either cover stamped, 
 She leaned, and read — a chronicle it was 
 In which the sound of hautboys stirred the pulse, 
 And masques and gilded pageants fed the eye. 
 Though here and there the vellum page was 
 
 stained 
 Sanguine with battle, chiefly it was love 
 The stylus held — some wan-cheeked scribe, 
 
 perchance. 
 That in a mouldy tower by candle-light 
 Forgot his hunger in his madrigals. 
 Outside was winter : in its winding-sheet 
 
36 WHITE EDITH 
 
 The frozen Year lay. Silent was the room, 
 Save when the wind against the casement pressed 
 Or a page rtistled, turned impatiently, 
 Or when along the still damp apple-wood 
 A little flame ran that chirped like a bird — 
 Some wren's ghost haunting the familiar bough. 
 
 With parted lips, in which less color lived 
 Than paints the pale wild-rose, she leaned and 
 
 read. 
 From time to time her fingers unawares 
 Closed on the palm ; and oft upon her cheek 
 The pallor died, and left such transient glow 
 As might from some rich chapel window fall 
 On a girl's cheek at prayer. So moved her soul. 
 From this dull age unshackled and divorced, 
 In far moon-haunted gardens of romance. 
 
WHITE EDITH 37 
 
 But once the wind that swept the palsied oaks, 
 As if new-pierced with sorrow, came and moaned 
 Close by the casement ; then she raised her eyes, 
 The light of dreams still fringing them, and spoke : 
 " Tell me, good cousin, does this book say true ? 
 Is it so fine a thing to be a queen? " 
 
 As if a spell of incantation dwelt 
 In those soft syllables, before me stood. 
 Colored like life, the phantasm of a maid 
 Who, in the savage childhood of this world, 
 Was crowned by error, or through dark intent 
 Made queen, and for the durance of one day 
 The royal diadem and ermine wore. 
 In strange sort wore — for this queen fed the 
 
 starved, 
 The naked clothed, threw open dungeon doors ; 
 
38 WHITE EDITH 
 
 Could to no story list of suffering 
 But the full tear was lovely on her lash ; 
 Taught Grief to smile, and wan Despair to hope j 
 Upon her stainless bosom pillowed Sin 
 Repentant at her feet — like Him of old ; 
 Made even the kerns and wild-men of the fells, 
 That sniffing pillage clamored at the gate. 
 Gentler than doves by some unknown white art. 
 And saying to herself, " So, I am Queen ! " 
 With lip all tremulous, held out her hand 
 To the crowd's kiss. What joy to ease the hurt 
 Of bruised hearts ! As in a trance she walked 
 That live-long day. Then night came, and the 
 
 stars, 
 And blissful sleep. But ere the birds were called 
 By bluebell chimes (unheard of mortal ear) 
 To matins in their branch-hung priories — 
 
WHITE EDITH 39 
 
 Ere yet the dawn its gleaming edge lay bare 
 Like to the burnished axe's subtle edge, 
 She, from her sleep's caresses roughly torn, 
 The meek eyes blinking in the torches' glare, 
 Upon a scaffold for her glory paid 
 Her cheeks' two roses. For it so befell 
 That from the Northland there was come a prince. 
 With a great clash of shields and trailing spears 
 Through the black portals of the breathless night, 
 To claim the sceptre. He no less would take 
 Than those same roses for his usury. 
 What less, in faith ! The throne was rightly his 
 Of that sea-girdled isle ; so to the block 
 Needs go the ringlets and the white swan-throat. 
 A touch of steel, a sudden darkness, then 
 Blue Heaven and all the hymning angel-choir ! 
 No tears for her — keep tears for those who live 
 
40 WHITE EDITH 
 
 To mate with sin and shame, and have remorse 
 At last to light them to unhallowed earth. 
 Hers no such low-hung fortunes. Thus to stand 
 Supreme one instant at that dizzy height, 
 With no hoarse raven croaking in her ear 
 The certain doom, and then to have life's rose 
 Struck swiftly from the cheek, and so escape 
 Love's death, black treason, friend's ingratitude, 
 The pang of separation, chill of age. 
 The grief that in an empty cradle lies, 
 And all the unspoke sorrow women know — 
 That was, in truth, to have a happy reign ! 
 Has thine been happier, Sovereign of the Sea, 
 In that long-mateless pilgrimage to death ? 
 Or thine, whose beauty like a star illumed 
 Awhile the dark and angry sky of France, 
 Thy kingdom shrunken to two exiled graves ? 
 
WHITE EDITH 41 
 
 Sweet old-world maid, a gentler fate was yours ! 
 Would he had wed your story to his verse 
 Who from the misty land of legend brought 
 Helen of Troy to gladden English eyes. 
 There 's many a queen that lived her grandeur out, 
 Gray-haired and broken, might have envied you, 
 Your Majesty, that reigned a single day ! 
 
 All this, as 't were between two beats of heart. 
 Flashed through my mind, so lightning-like is 
 
 thought. 
 With lifted eyes expectant, there she sat 
 Whose words had sent my fancy over-sea, 
 Her lip still trembling with its own soft speech, 
 As for a moment trembles the curved spray 
 Whence some winged melody has taken flight. 
 How every circumstance of time and place 
 
42 WHITE EDITH 
 
 Upon the glass of memory lives again ! — 
 
 The bleak New England road ; the level boughs 
 
 Like bars of iron across the setting sun ; 
 
 The gray ribbed clouds piled up against the West ; 
 
 The windows splashed with frost ; the fire-lit 
 
 room, 
 And in the antique chair that slight girl-shape, 
 The auburn braid about the saintly brows 
 Making a nimbus, and she white as snow ! 
 
 " Dear Heart," I said, " the humblest place is 
 
 best 
 For gentle souls — the throne's foot, not the 
 
 throne. 
 The storms that smite the dizzy solitudes 
 Where monarchs sit — most lonely folk are 
 
 they ! — 
 
WHITE EDITH 43 
 
 Oft leave the vale unscathed ; there dwells 
 
 content, 
 If so content have habitation here. 
 Never have I in annals read or rhyme 
 Of queen save one that found not at the end 
 The cup too bitter ; never queen save one, 
 And she — her empire lasted but a day ! 
 Yet that brief breath of time did she so fill 
 With mercy, love, and holy charity 
 As more rich made it than long-drawn-out years 
 Of such weed-life as drinks the lavish sun 
 And rots unflower'd." " Straight tell me of that 
 
 queen ! " 
 Cried Edith ; " Brunhild, in my legend here, 
 Is lovely — was that other still more fair ? 
 And had she not a Siegfried at the court 
 To steal her talisman ? — that Siegfried did 
 
44 WHITE EDITH 
 
 At Giinther's bidding. Was your queen not 
 
 loved ? 
 Tell me it all ! " With chin upon her palm 
 Resting, she listened, and within her eyes 
 The sapphire deepened as I told the tale 
 Of the girl-empress in the dawn of Time — 
 A flower that on the vermeil brink of May 
 Died, with its folded whiteness for a shroud ; 
 A strain of music that, ere it was mixed 
 With baser voices, floated up to heaven. 
 
 Without was silence, for the wind was spent 
 That all the day had pleaded at the door. 
 Against the crimson sunset elm and oak 
 Stood black and motionless ; among the boughs 
 The sad wind slumbered. Silence filled the 
 room, 
 
WHITE EDITH 45 
 
 Save when from out the crumbled apple branch 
 Came the wren's twitter, faint, and fainter now. 
 Like a bird's note far heard in twilight woods. 
 No other sound was. Presently a hand 
 Stole into mine, and rested there, inert. 
 Like some new-gathered snowy hyacinth, 
 So white and cold and delicate it was. 
 I know not what dark shadow crossed my heart, 
 What vague presentiment, but as I stooped 
 To lift the slender fingers to my lip, 
 I saw it through a mist of strangest tears — 
 The thin white hand invisible Death had 
 touched ! 
 
INTERLUDES 
 
/ 
 
 INSOMNIA 
 
 Slumber, hasten down this way, 
 And, ere midnight dies, 
 
 Silence lay upon my lips, 
 Darkness on my eyes. 
 
 Send me a fantastic dream ; 
 
 Fashion me afresh ; 
 Into some celestial thing 
 
 Change this mortal flesh. 
 
 Well I know one may not choose ; 
 One is helpless still 
 
5° INSOMNIA 
 
 In the purple realm of Sleep : 
 Use me as you will. 
 
 Let me be a frozen pine 
 In dead glacier lands ; 
 
 Let me pant, a leopard stretched 
 On the Libyan sands. 
 
 Silver fin or scarlet wing 
 Grant me, either one ; 
 
 Sink me deep in emerald glooms, 
 Lift me to the sun. 
 
 Or of me a gargoyle make. 
 Face of ape or gnome, 
 
 Such as frights the tavern-boor 
 Reeling drunken home. 
 
INSOMNIA SI 
 
 Work on me your own caprice, 
 
 Give me any shape ; 
 Only, Slumber, from myself 
 
 Let myself escape ! 
 
SEEMING DEFEAT 
 
 The woodland silence, one time stirred 
 By the soft pathos of some passing bird, 
 
 Is not the same it was before. 
 The spot where once, unseen, a flower 
 Has held its fragile chalice to the shower, 
 Is different for evermore. 
 Unheard, unseen, 
 A spell has been ! 
 
 O thou that breathest year by year 
 Music that falls unheeded on the ear, 
 
 Take heart, fate has not baffled thee ! 
 Thou that with tints of earth and skies 
 
SEEMING DEFEAT S3 
 
 Fillest thy canvas for unseeing eyes, 
 Thou hast not labored futilely. 
 Unheard, unseen, 
 A spell has been I 
 
/ TWO MOODS 
 
 I 
 Between the budding and the falling leaf 
 Stretch happy skies ; 
 With colors and sweet cries 
 Of mating birds in uplands and in glades 
 The world is rife. 
 
 Then on a sudden all the music dies, 
 The color fades. 
 How fugitive and brief 
 Is mortal life 
 Between the budding and the falling leaf ! 
 
TWO MOODS SS 
 
 O short-breathed music, dying on the tongue 
 Ere half the mystic canticle be sung ! 
 
 harp of life, so speedily unstrung ! 
 
 Who, if 't were his to choose, would know again 
 The bitter sweetness of the lost refrain. 
 Its rapture, and its pain ? 
 
 II 
 Though I be shut in darkness, and become 
 Insentient dust blown idly here and there, 
 
 1 count oblivion a scant price to pay 
 For having once had held against my lip 
 Life's brimming cup of hydromel and rue — 
 For having once known woman's holy love 
 And a child's kiss, and for a little space 
 Been boon companion to the Day and Night, 
 Fed on the odors of the summer dawn, 
 
 // 
 
S6 TWO MOODS 
 
 And folded in the beauty of the stars. 
 Dear Lord, though I be changed to senseless clay, 
 And serve the potter as he turns his wheel, 
 I thank Thee for the gracious gift of tears ! 
 
A PARABLE 
 
 One went East, and one went West 
 
 Across the wild sea-foam, 
 And both were on the self-same quest. 
 Now one there was who cared for naught. 
 
 So stayed at home : 
 Yet of the three 't was only he 
 Who reached the goal — by him unsought. 
 
"GREAT CAPTAIN, GLORIOUS IN OUR 
 WARS " 
 
 Great Captain, glorious in our wars — 
 No meed of praise we hold from him ; 
 About his brow we wreathe the stars 
 The coming ages shall not dim. 
 
 The cloud-sent man ! Was it not he 
 That from the hand of adverse fate 
 Snatched the white flower of victory ? 
 He spoke no word, but saved the State. 
 
 Yet History, as she brooding bends 
 Above the tablet on her knee. 
 
GREAT CAPTAIN 59 
 
 The impartial stylus half suspends, 
 And fain would blot the cold decree : 
 
 " The iron hand and sleepless care 
 That stayed disaster scarce availed 
 To serve him when he came to wear 
 The civic laurel : there he failed." 
 
 Who runs may read ; but nothing mars 
 That nobler record, unforgot. 
 Great Captain, glorious in our wars — 
 All else the heart remembers not. 
 
A REFRAIN 
 
 High in a tower she sings, 
 
 I, passing by beneath, 
 Pause and listen, and catch 
 
 These words of passionate breath — 
 " Asphodel, flower of Life; amaranth, flower of 
 Death I" 
 
 Sweet voice, sweet unto tears ! 
 
 What is this that she saith ? 
 Poignant, mystical — hark ! 
 
 Again, with passionate breath — 
 " Asphodel, flower of Life ; amaranth, flower of 
 Death!" 
 
1/ 
 
 AT NIJNII-NOVGOROD 
 
 " A CRAFTY Persian set this stone ; 
 A dusk Sultana wore it ; 
 And from her slender finger, sir, 
 A ruthless Arab tore it. 
 
 " A ruby, like a drop of blood — 
 That deep-in tint that lingers 
 And seems to melt, perchance was caught 
 From those poor mangled fingers ! 
 
 " A spendthrift got it from the knave. 
 And tost it, like a blossom. 
 
62 AT NryNII-NOVGOROD 
 
 That night into a dancing-girl's 
 Accurst and balmy bosom. 
 
 " And so it went. One day a Jew 
 At Cairo chanced to spy it 
 Amid a one-eyed peddler's pack, 
 And did not care to buy it — 
 
 " Yet bought it all the same. You see, 
 The Jew he knew a jewel. 
 He bought it cheap to sell it dear : 
 The ways of trade are cruel. 
 
 " But I —be Allah's all the praise ! — 
 Such avarice, I scoff it ! 
 If I buy cheap, why, I sell cheap, 
 Content with modest profit. 
 
AT Niymi-NOVGOROD 63 
 
 "This ring — such chasing! look, milord, 
 What workmanship ! By Heaven, 
 The price I name you makes the thing 
 As if the thing were given ! 
 
 " A stone without a flaw ! A queen 
 Might not disdain to wear it. 
 Three hundred roubles buys the stone ; 
 No kopeck less, I swear it ! " 
 
 Thus Hassan, holding up the ring 
 
 To me, no eager buyer. — 
 A hundred roubles was not much 
 
 To pay so sweet a liar ! 
 
THE WINTER ROBIN 
 
 Sursum corda 
 
 Now is that sad time of year 
 Wlien no flower or leaf is here ; 
 When in misty Southern ways 
 Oriole and jay have flown, 
 And of all sweet birds, alone 
 The robin stays. 
 
 So give thanks at Christmas-tide : 
 Hopes of spring-time yet abide ! 
 See, in spite of darksome days. 
 Wind and rain and bitter chill, 
 Snow, and sleet-hung branches, still 
 The robin stays ! 
 
THE SAILING OF THE AUTOCRAT 
 
 ON BOARD THE S. S. CEPHALONIA, APRIL 26, 
 1886 
 
 I 
 
 O Wind and Wave, be kind to him ! 
 So, Wave and Wind, we give thee thanks ! 
 O Fog, that from Newfoundland Banks 
 Makest the blue bright ocean dim, 
 Delay him not ! And ye who snare 
 The wa)rworn shipman with your song. 
 Go pipe your ditties otherwhere 
 While this brave vessel plows along ! 
 If still to lure him be your thought, 
 O phantoms of the watery zone, 
 
66 THE SAILING OF THE AUTOCRAT 
 
 Look lively lest yourselves get caught 
 With music sweeter than your own ! 
 
 II 
 Yet, soft sea-spirits, be not mute ; 
 Murmur about the prow, and make 
 Melodious the west-wind's lute. 
 For him may radiant mornings break 
 From out the bosom of the deep, 
 And golden noons above him bend. 
 And fortunate constellations keep 
 Bright vigils to his journey's end ! 
 
 Ill 
 Take him, green Erin, to thy breast ! 
 Keep him, gray London — for a while ! 
 In him we send thee of our best. 
 
THE SAILING OF THE AUTOCRAT 67 
 
 Our wisest word, our blithest smile — 
 Our epigram, alert and pat. 
 That kills with joy the folly hit — 
 Our Yankee Tsar, our Autocrat 
 Of all the happy realms of wit ! 
 Take him and keep him — but forbear 
 To keep him more than half a year. . . . 
 His presence will be sunshine there, 
 His absence will be shadow here ! 
 
CRADLE SONG 
 
 I 
 Ere the moon begins to rise 
 
 Or a star to shine, 
 All the bluebells close their eyes ■ 
 So close thine, 
 
 Thine, dear, thine ! 
 
 II 
 Birds are sleeping in the nest 
 
 On the swaying bough. 
 Thus, against the mother-breast - 
 So sleep thou. 
 
 Sleep, sleep, sleep ! 
 
BROKEN MUSIC 
 
 A note 
 All out of tune in this world's instrument* 
 
 Amy Levy. 
 
 I KNOW not in what fashion she was made, 
 Nor what her voice was, when she used to 
 speak, 
 Nor if the silken lashes threw a shade 
 On wan or rosy cheek. 
 
 I picture her with sorrowful vague eyes 
 
 Illumed with such strange gleams of inner light 
 As linger in the drift of London skies 
 Ere twilight turns to night. 
 
70 BROKEN MUSIC 
 
 I know not ; I conjecture. 'T was a girl 
 
 That with her own most gentle desperate hand 
 From out God's mystic setting plucked life's 
 pearl ^ 
 
 'T is hard to understand. 
 
 So precious life is ! Even to the old 
 
 The hours are as a miser's coins, and she — 
 Within her hands lay youth's unminted gold 
 And all felicity. 
 
 The winged impetuous spirit, the white flame 
 
 That was her soul once, whither has it flown ? 
 Above her brow gray lichens blot her name 
 Upon the carven stone. 
 
 This is her Book of Verses — wren-like notes, 
 Shy franknesses, blind gropings, haunting fears ; 
 
BROKEN MUSIC 71 
 
 At times across the chords abruptly floats 
 A mist of passionate tears. 
 
 A fragile lyre too tensely keyed and strung, 
 
 A broken music, weirdly incomplete : 
 Here a proud mind, self-baffled and self-stung, 
 Lies coiled in dark defeat. 
 
ART 
 
 " Let art be all in all," one time I said, 
 And straightway stirred the hypercritic gall : 
 I said not, " Let technique be all in all," 
 But art — a wider meaning. Worthless, dead — 
 The shell without its pearl, the corpse of things — 
 Mere words are, till the spirit lend them wings. 
 The poet who wakes no soul within his lute 
 Falls short of art : 'twere better he were mute. 
 
 } The workmanship wherewith the gold is wrought 
 / Adds yet a richness to the richest gold : 
 j Who lacks the art to shape his thought, I hold. 
 Were little poorer if he lacked the thought. 
 
ART 73 
 
 The statue's slumber were unbroken still 
 In the dull marble, had the hand no skill. 
 Disparage not the magic touch that gives 
 The formless thought the grace whereby it lives ! 
 
"WHEN FROM THE TENSE CHORDS 
 OF THAT MIGHTY LYRE" 
 
 January, 1892 
 
 I 
 
 When from the tense chords of that mighty Ijtc 
 The Master's hand, relaxing, falls away. 
 And those rich strings are silent for all time. 
 Then shall Love pine, and Passion lack her fire. 
 And Faith seem voiceless. Man to man shall 
 say, 
 "Dead is the last of England's Lords of 
 Rhyme." 
 
 II 
 Yet — stay ! there 's one, a later laureled brow. 
 With purple blood of poets in his veins ; 
 
WHEN FROM THE TENSE CHORDS 75 
 
 Him has the Muse claimed ; him might Mar- 
 lowe own ; 
 Greek Sappho's son ! — men's praises seek him 
 now. 
 Happy the realm where one such voice re- 
 mains ! 
 His the dropt wreath and the unenvied 
 throne. 
 
 Ill 
 The wreath the world gives, not the mimic wreath 
 That chance might make the gift of king or 
 queen. 
 O finder of imdreamed-of harmonies ! 
 Since Shelley's lips were hushed by cruel death, 
 What l)rric voice so sweet as this has been 
 Borne to us on the winds from over seas ? 
 
^ . s™... 
 
 Imp of Dreams, when she 's asleep, 
 To her snowy chamber creep, 
 And straight whisper in her ear 
 What, awake, she will not hear — 
 Imp of Dreams, when she 's asleep. 
 
 Tell her, so she may repent. 
 That no rose withholds its scent. 
 That no bird that has a song 
 Hoards the music summer-long — 
 Tell her, so she may repent. 
 
A SERENADE 77 
 
 Tell her there 's naught else to do, 
 If to-morrow's skies be blue, 
 But to come, with civil speech. 
 And walk with me to Chelsea Beach — 
 Tell her there 's naught else to do ! 
 Tell her, so she may repent — 
 
 Imp of Dreams, when she 's asleep ! 
 
/ 
 
 A BRIDAL MEASURE 
 
 FOR S. F. 
 
 GiPTS they sent her manifold. 
 Diamonds and pearls and gold. 
 One there was among the throng 
 Had not Midas' touch at need : 
 He against a sylvan reed 
 Set his lips and breathed a song. 
 
 Bid bright Flora, as she comes, 
 Snatch a spray of orange blooms 
 For a maiden's hair. 
 
A BRIDAL MEASURE 79 
 
 Let the Hours their aprons fill 
 With mignonette and daffodil, 
 And all that 's fair. 
 
 For her bosom fetch the rose 
 
 That is rarest — 
 Not that either these or those 
 
 Could by any happening be 
 
 Ornaments to such as she ; 
 They '11 but show, when she is dressed, 
 
 She is fairer than the fairest 
 And out-betters what is best ! 
 
IMOGEN 
 
 LEONATUS posTHUMUs speaks; 
 
 Sorrow, make a verse for me 
 
 That shall breathe all human grieving ; 
 Let it be love's exequy, 
 
 And the knell of all believing ! 
 
 Let it such sweet pathos have 
 
 As a violet on a grave, 
 Or a dove's moan when his mate 
 Leaves the new nest desolate. 
 
 Sorrow, Sorrow, by this token, 
 
 Braid a wreath for Beauty's head. . . . 
 
IMOGEN 8 1 
 
 Valley-lilies, one or two, 
 Should be woven with the rue. 
 Sorrow, Sorrow, all is spoken — 
 She is dead ! 
 
SEVEN SONNETS 
 
OUTWARD BOUND 
 
 I LEAVE behind me the elm-shadowed square 
 And carven portals of the silent street, 
 And wander on with listless, vagrant feet 
 Through seaward-leading alleys, till the air 
 Smells of the sea, and straightway then the care 
 Slips from my heart, and life once more is sweet. 
 At the lane's ending lie the white-winged fleet. 
 O restless Fancy, whither woi^ldst thou fare ? 
 Here are brave pinions that shall take thee far — 
 Gaunt hulks of Norway ; ships of red Ceylon ; 
 
86 OUTWARD BOUND 
 
 Slim-masted lovers of the blue Azores ! 
 'T is but an instant hence to Zanzibar, 
 Or to the regions of the Midnight Sun : 
 Ionian isles are thine, and all the fairy shores ! 
 
II 
 
 ELLEN TERRY IN "THE MERCHANT 
 OF VENICE" 
 
 As there she lives and moves upon the scene, 
 So lived and moved this radiant womanhood 
 In Shakespeare's vision ; in such wise she 
 
 stood 
 Smiling upon Bassanio ; such her mien 
 When pity dimmed her eyelids' golden sheen, 
 Hearing Antonio's story, and the blood 
 Paled on her cheek, and all her lightsome mood 
 Was gone. This shape in Shakespeare's 
 
 thought has been ! 
 
88 ELLEN TERRY 
 
 Thus dreamt he of her in gray London town ; 
 Such were her eyes ; on such gold-colored hair 
 The grave young judge's velvet cap was set ; 
 So stood she lovely in her crimson gown. 
 Mine were a happy cast, could I but snare 
 Her beauty in a sonnet's fragile net ! 
 
Ill 
 
 THE POETS 
 
 When this young Land has reached its wrinkled 
 
 prime, 
 And we are gone and all our songs are done, 
 And naught is left unchanged beneath the sun, 
 What other singers shall the womb of Time 
 Bring forth to reap the sunny slopes of rh)Tne ? 
 For surely till the thread of life be spun 
 The world shall not lack poets, though but one 
 Make lonely music like a vesper chime 
 Above the heedless turmoil of the street. 
 What new strange voices shall be given to these, 
 
90 THE POETS 
 
 What richer accents of melodious breath ? 
 Yet shall they, baffled, lie at Nature's feet 
 Searching the volume of her mysteries, 
 And vainly question the fixed eyes of Death. 
 
IV 
 
 J THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY 
 
 Forever am I conscious, moving here, 
 That should I step a little space aside 
 I pass the boundary of some glorified 
 Invisible domain — it lies so near ! 
 Yet nothing know we of that dim frontier 
 Which each must cross, whatever fate betide, 
 To reach the heavenly cities where abide 
 (Thus Sorrow whispers) those that were most 
 
 dear. 
 Now all transfigured in celestial light ! 
 Shall we indeed behold them, thine and mine. 
 
92 THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY 
 
 Whose going hence made black the noonday 
 
 sun ? — 
 Strange is it that across the narrow night 
 They fling us not some token, or make sign 
 That all beyond is not-Oblivion. 
 
BOOKS AND SEASONS 
 
 Because the sky is blue ; because blithe May 
 Masks in the wren's note and the lilac's hue ; 
 Becg-use — in fine, because the sky is blue 
 I will read none but piteous tales to-day. 
 Keep happy laughter till the skies be gray, 
 And the sad season cypress wears, and rue ; 
 Then, when the wind is moaning in the flue. 
 And ways are dark, bid Chaucer make us gay. 
 But now a little sadness ! All too sweet 
 This springtide riot, this most poignant air, 
 
94 BOOKS AND SEASONS 
 
 This sensuous sphere of color and perfume ! 
 So listen, love, while I the woes repeat 
 Of Hamlet and Ophelia, and that pair 
 Whose bridal bed was builded in a tomb. 
 
VI 
 
 REMINISCENCE 
 
 Though I am native to this frozen zone 
 That half the twelvemonth torpid lies, or dead ; 
 Though the cold azure arching overhead 
 And the Atlantic's never-ending moan 
 Are mine by heritage, I must have known 
 Life otherwhere in epochs long since fled ; 
 For in my veins some Orient blood is red. 
 And through my thought are lotus blossoms 
 
 blown. 
 I do remember ... it was just at dusk, 
 Near a walled garden at the river's turn 
 
9^ REMINISCENCE 
 
 (A thousand summers seem but yesterday !), 
 A Nubian girl, more sweet than Khoorja musk, 
 Came to the water-tank to fill her urn. 
 And, with the urn, she bore my heart away ! 
 
VII 
 
 ANDROMEDA 
 
 The smooth-worn coin and threadbare classic 
 
 phrase 
 Of Grecian myths that did beguile my youth, 
 Beguile me not as in the olden days : 
 I think more grief and beauty dwell with truth. 
 Andromeda, in fetters by the sea, 
 Star-pale with anguish till young Perseus came, 
 Less moves me with her suffering than she. 
 The slim girl figure fettered to dark shame, 
 That nightly haunts the park, there, like a shade. 
 Trailing her wretchedness from street to street. 
 
98 ANDROMEDA 
 
 See where she passes — neither wife nor maid. 
 How all mere fiction crumbles at her feet ! 
 Here is woe's self, and not the mask of woe : 
 A legend's shadow shall not move you so ! 
 
NOURMADEE 
 
yr' 
 
 NOURMADEE 
 
 THE POET MIRTZy MOHAMMED-ALI TO HIS 
 FKIEND ABOU-HASSEM IN ALGEZIRAS 
 
 O Hassem, greeting ! Peace be thine ! 
 With thee and thine be all things well ! 
 Give refuge to these words of mine. 
 The strange mischance which late befell 
 Thy servant must have reached thine ear ; 
 Rumor has flung it far and wide, 
 With dark additions, as I hear. 
 /When They-Say speaks, what ills betide ! | 
 
NOURMADEE 
 
 So lend no credence, O my Friend, 
 To scandals, fattening as they fly. 
 Love signs and seals the roll I send : 
 Read thou the truth with lenient eye. 
 
NOURMADEE 103 
 
 In Yilssuf's garden at Tangier 
 This happened. In his cool kiosk 
 We sat partaking of his cheer — 
 Thou know'st that garden by the Mosque 
 Of Irma ; stately palms are there, 
 And silver fish in marble tanks, 
 And scents of jasmine in the air — 
 We sat and feasted, with due thanks 
 To Allah, till the pipes were brought ; 
 And no one spoke, for Pleasure laid 
 Her finger on the lips of Thought. 
 Then, on a sudden, came a maid, 
 With tambourine, to dance for us — 
 Allah il' Allah ! it was she, 
 
104 NOURMADEE 
 
 The slave-girl from the Bosphorus 
 That Yiissuf purchased recently. 
 
 Long narrow eyes, as black as black ! 
 And melting, like the stars in June ; 
 Tresses of night drawn smoothly back 
 From eyebrows like the crescent moon. 
 She paused an instant with bowed head. 
 Then, at a motion of her wrist, 
 A veil of gossamer outspread 
 And wrapt her in a silver mist. 
 Her tunic was of Tiflis green 
 Shot through with many a starry speck ; 
 The zone that claspt it might have been 
 A collar for a cygnet's neck. 
 None of the twenty charms she lacked 
 Demanded for perfection's grace ; 
 
NOURMADEE 105 
 
 Charm upon charm in her was packed 
 
 Like rose leaves in a costly vase. 
 
 Full in the lanterns' colored light 
 
 She seemed a thing of Paradise. 
 
 I knew not if I saw aright, 
 
 Or if my vision told me lies. 
 
 Those lanterns spread a cheating glare ; 
 
 Such stains they threw from bough and vine 
 
 As if the slave-boys, here and there, 
 
 Had spilt a jar of brilliant wine. 
 
 And then the fountain's drowsy fall, 
 
 The burning aloes' heavy scent, 
 
 The night, the place, the hour — they all 
 
 Were full of subtle blandishment. 
 
 Much had I heard of Nourmadee — 
 The name of this fair slenderness — 
 
lo6 NOURMADEE 
 
 Whom Yiissuf kept with lock and key 
 
 Because her beauty wrought distress 
 
 In all men's hearts that gazed on it ; 
 
 And much I marveled why, this night, 
 
 Yiissuf should have the little wit 
 
 To lift her veil for our delight. 
 
 For though the other guests were old — 
 
 Grave, worthy merchants, three from Fez 
 
 (These mostly dealt in dyes and gold). 
 
 Cloth merchants two, from Mekinez — 
 
 Though they were old and gray and dry, 
 
 Forgetful of their youth's desires. 
 
 My case was different, for I 
 
 Still knew the touch of springtime fires. 
 
 And straightway as I looked on her 
 
 I bit my lip, grew ill at ease, 
 
 And in my veins was that strange stir 
 
 Which clothes with bloom the almond-trees. 
 
NOURMADEE 1 07 
 
 O Shape of blended fire and snow ! 
 
 Each clime to her some spell had lent — 
 
 The North her cold, the South her glow, 
 
 Her languors all the Orient. 
 1 Her scarf was as the cloudy fleece 
 / The moon draws round its loveliness, 
 
 That so its beauty may increase 
 ) The more in being seen the less. 
 
 And as she moved, and seemed to float — 
 
 iSo floats a swan ! — in sweet unrest, 
 
 A string of sequins at her throat 
 / Went clink and clink against her breast. 
 
 And what did some birth-fairy do 
 i But set a mole, a golden dot. 
 
 Close to her lip — to pierce men through ! 
 
 How could I look and love her not .'' 
 
lo8 NOURMADEB 
 
 Yet heavy was my heart as stone, 
 For well I knew that love was vain ; 
 To love the thing one may not own ! — 
 I saw how all my peace was slain. 
 Coffers of ingots Yiissuf had, 
 Houses on land, and ships at sea. 
 And I — alas ! was I gone mad, 
 To cast my eyes on Nourmadee ! 
 I strove to thrust her from my mind, 
 I bent my brows, and turned away, 
 And wished that Fate had struck me blind 
 Ere I had come to know that day. 
 I fixed my thoughts on this and that ; 
 Assessed the worth of Yiissuf's ring ; 
 Counted the colors in the mat — 
 And then a bird began to sing, 
 A bulbul hidden in a bough. 
 
NOURMADEE 1 09 
 
 From time to time it loosed a strain 
 Of moonlit magic that, somehow, 
 Brought comfort to my troubled brain. 
 
 But when the girl once, creeping close. 
 Half stooped, and looked me in the face. 
 My reason fled, and I arose 
 And cried to Yiissuf, from my place : 
 
 " O Ydssuf, give to me this girl ! 
 You are so rich and I so poor ! 
 You would not miss one little pearl 
 Like that from out your countless store ! " 
 
 " ' This girl ' ? What girl ? No girl is here ! " 
 Cried Yiissuf with his eyes agleam ; 
 
 " Now, by the Prophet, it is clear 
 Our friend has had a pleasant dream ! " 
 (And then it seems that I awoke. 
 
NOURMADEE 
 
 And stared around, no little dazed 
 At finding naught of what I spoke : 
 The guests sat silent and amazed.) 
 
 Then YUssuf — of all mortal men 
 This Yiissuf has a mocking tongue ! — 
 Stood at my side, and spoke again : 
 ' O Mirtzy, I too once was young. 
 -With mandolin or dulcimer 
 ' I 've waited many a midnight through, 
 I Content to catch one glimpse of Her, 
 I And have my turban drenched with dew. 
 * By Her I mean some slim Malay, 
 Some Andalusian with her fan 
 (For I have traveled in my day). 
 Or some swart beauty of Soudan. 
 No Barmecide was I to fare 
 
 \ 
 (I 
 
NOURMADEE m 
 
 On fancy's shadowy wine and meat ; 
 No phantom moulded out of air 
 Had spells to lure me to her feet. 
 
 Mirtzy, be it understood 
 
 1 blame you not. Your sin is slight ! — 
 You fled the world of flesh and blood, 
 And loved a vision of the night ! 
 Sweeter than musk such visions be 
 
 As come to poets when they sleep ! 
 You dreamed you saw fair Nourmadee ? 
 Go to ! it is a pearl I keep ! " 
 
 By Allah, but his touch was true ! 
 And I was humbled to the dust 
 That I in those grave merchants' view 
 Should seem a thing no man might trust. 
 / /For he of creeping things is least 
 
112 NOURMADEE 
 
 /Who, while he breaks of friendship's bread, 
 
 / Betrays the giver of the feast. 
 
 " Good friends, I 'm not that man ! " I said. 
 
 " O Yiissuf, shut not Pardon's gate ! 
 The words I spake I no wise meant. 
 Who holds the threads of Time and Fate 
 Sends dreams. I dreamt the dream he sent. 
 I am as one that from a trance 
 Awakes confused, and reasons ill ; 
 The world of men invites his glance. 
 The world of shadows claims him still. 
 I see those lights among the leaves, 
 Yourselves I see, sedate and wise. 
 And yet some finer sense perceives 
 A presence that eludes the eyes. 
 Of what is gone there seems to stay 
 Some subtlety, to mock my pains : 
 
NOURMADEE 113 
 
 So, when a rose is borne away, 
 The fragrance of the rose remains I " 
 Then Yiissuf laughed, Abdallah leered. 
 And Melik coughed behind his hand. 
 And lean Ben-Auda stroked his beard 
 As who should say, " We understand ! " 
 And though the fault was none of mine. 
 As I explained and made appear, 
 Since then I 've not been asked to dine 
 In Yiissuf's garden at Tangier. 
 
114 NOURMADEE 
 
 Farewell, O Hassem ! Peace be thine ! 
 With thee and thine be always Peace ! 
 To virtue let thy steps incline, 
 And may thy shadow not decrease ! 
 Get wealth — wealth makes the dullard's jest 
 Seem witty where true wit falls flat ; 
 Do good, for goodness still is best — 
 But then the Koran tells thee that. 
 Know Patience here, and later Bliss ; 
 Grow wise, trust woman, doubt not man ; 
 And when thou dinest out — mark this — 
 Beware of wines from Ispahan ! 
 
FOOTNOTES 
 
FIREFLIES 
 
 See where at intervals the firefly's spark 
 Glimmers, and melts into the fragrant dark ; 
 Gilds a leaf's edge one happy instant, then 
 Leaves darkness all a mystery again ! 
 
 PROBLEM 
 
 . I So closely knit are mind and brain, 
 / ' Such web and woof are soul and clay, 
 How is it, being rent in twain, 
 One part shall live, and one decay ? 
 
Il8 FOOTNOTES 
 
 ORIGINALITY 
 
 y 
 
 No bird has ever uttered note 
 That was not in some first bird's throat ; 
 Since Eden's freshness and man's fall 
 No rose has been original. 
 
 KISMET 
 
 A GLANCE, a word — and joy or pain 
 Befalls ; what was no more shall be. 
 How slight the links are in the chain 
 That binds us to our destiny 1 
 
FOOTNOTES 119 
 
 A HINT FROM HERRICK 
 
 No slightest golden rhyme he wrote 
 That held not something men must quote ; 
 Thus by design or chance did he 
 Drop anchors to posterity. 
 
 PESSIMISTIC POETS 
 
 I LITTLE read those poets who have made 
 A noble art a pessimistic trade, 
 And trained their Pegasus to draw a hearse 
 Through aidless avenues of drooping verse. 
 
FOOTNOTES 
 
 HOSPITALITY 
 
 When friends are at your hearthside met, 
 Sweet courtesy has done its most 
 If you have made each guest forget 
 That he himself is not the host. 
 
 POINTS OF VIEW 
 
 Bonnet in hand, obsequious and discreet. 
 
 The butcher that served Shakespeare with his 
 
 meat 
 Doubtless esteemed him little, as a man 
 Who knew not how the market prices ran. 
 
FOOTNOTES 
 
 THE TWO MASKS 
 
 I GAVE my heart its freedom to be gay 
 Or grave at will, when life was in its May ; 
 So I have gone, a pilgrim through the years, 
 With more of laughter in my scrip than tears. 
 
 QUITS 
 
 If my best wines mislike thy taste. 
 And my best service win thy frown, 
 Then tarry not, I bid thee haste ; 
 There 's many another Inn in town. 
 
i 
 
 i t