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 COF\'R!GHT DEPOSfT 
 
THE LUTANIST 
 
 ALICE WILSON 
 
 BOSTON 
 RICHARD G. BADGER 
 
 THE GORHAM PRESS 
 
Copyright, 1914, by Alice Wilson 
 
 All Rights Reserved 
 
 
 The Gorham press, Boston, U. S. A, 
 
 JAN -2 1915 J<-<5^ 
 
 ©aA393028 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Hero to Leander 7 
 
 Primavera 12 
 
 At Perugia— A Reverie 15 
 
 Invocation 21 
 
 Hermit Thrush 23 
 
 The Fuchsia's Prophesy 27 
 
 The River Path 29 
 
 The Gleaner 00 
 
 Stars '^ X 
 
 The Harper ^2 
 
 Song : The Desirous 33 
 
 Patterans -^4 
 
 Hidden Meadow 35 
 
 The Pear Tree in Blossom 36 
 
 Half Light nq 
 
 ''Fin al Marina" .* .' 40 
 
 Two Gardens 41 
 
 Water Fete 42 
 
 An Egyptian Tomb . a-> 
 
 Poet ;;; y^ 
 
 Rondeau, To Mme. J ^6 
 
 Pond Lilies, To Lucy W 57 
 
 Youth, To Theo ^^8 
 
 Moon-Dreams 59 
 
 Hope's Year 60 
 
 Autumn Undertone 61 
 
 Three Prayers 62 
 
 Sister Wings 63 
 
 Transmutation 64 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Whom He Loveth 65 
 
 Inner Peace 66 
 
 The Camel Driver 67 
 
 "Araignee du Soir, Espoir" 68 
 
 Bee Song 69 
 
 In Trinity Garden, Oxford 70 
 
 Errant Artemis 72 
 
 The White House Garden in May 74 
 
 Ode to Polymnia 76 
 
 TO CHILDREN 
 
 Little Lives 81 
 
 Child Song 81 
 
 Wayside Song 82 
 
 Playmates 82 
 
 Blossoms 83 
 
 Secret Voyage 84 
 
 A Duet 85 
 
 Church Bells 85 
 
 Ships 86 
 
 Light and Shadow 87 
 
 The Earth and Little Children 87 
 
 A Change of Mind 88 
 
 Summer Morning 8q 
 
 In May, To Eleanor 90 
 
 Wattie's Garden 91 
 
 Peggy Sweet 93 
 
 Brotherhood 94 
 
 Clover's Humming Song 95 
 
 Garden Song . 96 
 
THE LUTANIST 
 
HERO TO LEANDER 
 
 Was it yestermorn at Aphrodite's shrine 
 
 I stood a Vestal 'mid the flowery feast, 
 
 Cool-bosomed as a Goddess in her stone? 
 
 The chanting hushed, the garlands hung a'dream, 
 
 As into my young hands the solemn priest 
 
 Presented honors. Serene as morning star 
 
 I stood to pour libations and let fall 
 
 Rich incense into purifying flame. 
 
 Yet e'er I served I raised my pious eyes 
 
 As ever toward my Goddess. — Lo ! instead 
 
 (Oh, how the sweet remembrance startles yet I) 
 
 My lifted gaze was caught upon thy gaze 
 
 And burning hung for one eternal moment. 
 
 Leander, my beloved, from what star 
 
 Came thy dear birth upon me? Suddenly 
 
 The sound of priest's voice drew me back to vows ! 
 
 All while I fed the flame its holy food 
 
 Mine eyes close-shut their all dismayed sight 
 
 Seeking their olden memories and vows. 
 
 Where went they? Where my goddesses beloved? 
 
 Where the pure calm of statued presences? 
 
 Ah fled, before thine own white-passioned face. 
 
 Godlike yet far more dearly beautiful, 
 
 Whose worship newly bound me. 
 
 Oft had I scorned 
 To hear how sporting nymphs, in deep recesses 
 Of rock-cleft woodland sacred to their kind. 
 Full swiftly were caught back by prisoning reach 
 Of forest half-god — and their play was lost. 
 
 7 
 
Even so was I caught up from simple play 
 Of temple service to thy soul's high plain ! 
 
 Didst dream, Leander, while thou sawest me there, 
 
 How I stood overwhelmed before the throng? 
 
 My frightened purity, like flocks of doves. 
 
 Flew through me, o'er me, hiding with their wings 
 
 All the young faces of my sisters; — thine, 
 
 Immovable and adoring, not. 
 
 Some shock of wonder drew the feast apart. 
 
 I trembled. Thou didst tremble too, and went, 
 
 Oh slowly, slow, with oft-returning glance 
 
 Which I, too, greeted, long and slow and sweet. 
 
 How chilly grown the temple seemed, bedimmed 
 By long reflections of the marble shrines ! 
 Scentless the garlands hung, heavy the air 
 With faded incense ; mute the silence fell 
 From the dumb lips of carven goddesses! 
 Like song unuttered in a birdling's throat 
 Rose sudden sweetness from the thought of thee, 
 And with a sob I fled. 
 
 How far, Leander, 
 Measures the world from this high tower down ? 
 It seems a bud I plucked and left to float 
 Upon the sea waves when I blindly climbed 
 Up to my home of bare-walled chastity. 
 All day I wove my dreams and wrought thereon 
 Thy lily-face plucked cool from memory. 
 All day instead of prayer I murmured low 
 Thy name, Leander, and the air grew sweet 
 With first faint stir of scents awake at dawn. 
 
 8 
 
Long had I sat alone, shut In and high 
 
 In awful sanctity. The late hours fell 
 
 And found me each one prayerless as the last. 
 
 The last watch waned and waned; when soft the 
 
 casement 
 Was opened as a rose 'neath some warm touch. 
 I heard the swift, dark rush of buried waves 
 As a coiling monster far beneath. 
 The star-set night looked in. I raised my eyes 
 Thinking to take the air with soft drawn breath. 
 
 It was my lily bloomed against the dark ! 
 It was my soul's star set so near mine own! 
 For fairness, it had been a young god's face 
 Drawn near to me to claim my vestalhood, 
 But for the swift, pure mortal rush of bliss 
 Which deathless Gods are powerless to bestow. 
 I trembled as a wakened wood-pool stirred 
 From tranquil dimness through its shimmering 
 
 depth 
 By one gold-shafted star. Thy voice's breath 
 Fluttered my pulses as a million leaves 
 Would be disturbed beneath a breeze's breath. 
 
 "Good night, dear Nymph"; thus slow thy silver 
 
 words, 
 Scarce trusting to the silence, fell to me 
 In such sweet speech it would have held us long, 
 But that each moment still more tensely moved 
 Beneath new wonder. So we were drawn on 
 To nearer utterance, until each of each 
 Craved delicate contact, and thou enteredst ! 
 
The marvel of thee melted, as thou stoodst 
 Sea-drenched, alive, who had been only dream. 
 And all in sudden horror had closed my joy 
 But that thy wooing voice grew pitiful. 
 Thou seemedst so chill and drear, my breast so 
 
 warm, 
 I shrank no more. Swift then thine arms of flame 
 Leapt round me. — As the morning star, low-hung 
 Upon the border of the out-lived night 
 In acme of tense shining, fades at last 
 In the embracing glory of the sun, 
 So I In thee, Leander. 
 
 Then was It that I heard 
 The soft brush of the velvet-footed Gods 
 Departing from the room. With solemn sweep 
 Their garments nectar-dyed trailed after them 
 And slow the gleam of their sun-burnished hair 
 Retired wistfully. Yet once they turned, 
 With gracious arms held toward me; (Oh thine 
 
 arms 
 Sweetlier bound me) and look of divine awe 
 Whose fire was cold, they bent. But as of yore 
 From their proud lips they gave no utterance, 
 And vanished hungered, balked, but beautiful. 
 Sweet doth the memory of that earliest night 
 Come to me now, as scent of roses gone. 
 
 lO 
 
How the tower rocks 
 Beneath a wind Inimical to love ! 
 My lamp's gold flare battles against the dark 
 Even as thou, white-limbed, art tossed by waves 
 That breast thy coming. 
 
 I have never known 
 Such deep, unending dark to smite the world; 
 Or felt long length of time uncoil so slow 
 And slower coil again to stretch more slow 
 Twixt me and thee, a never-ending span ! 
 How the tower rocks I 
 
 II 
 
PRIMAVERA 
 
 TO E. C. 
 
 Never was such a Spring 
 
 Leapt in a moment to life, 
 Ran like a flame of joy 
 
 Over the earth and fled 
 Into the air with a song! 
 
 There it paused, and lo ! 
 It clings ! With feathery breath 
 
 Sways and lilts in the winds 
 And clings ! Brushes the world 
 
 Under and over. Stays 
 On the earth at the feet 
 
 As a dancing sea. 
 Bursts into buds overhead, 
 
 Ripples out millions of leaves. 
 Amasses ethereal folds 
 
 Of billowy mists of bloom ; 
 Pierces the sullen sod 
 
 With staffs of exquisite splendor, 
 Beckons the eye to delight 
 
 In discerning the dawn of its wonder; 
 Breaks the web of the air 
 
 Into ethereal beauty; 
 Sings and fills the branches 
 With gushes of golden light; 
 
 Sets the young birds wild 
 With their first sweet singing; — 
 
 Lifts the heart of the man, 
 Urges his feet to lightness. 
 Lures him along to his joy, 
 
 12 
 
Sends him flute for piping, 
 Sets him atune to his dreams. 
 
 Never was such a maid, 
 
 Veiled In the vision of life; 
 Masked with the grace of the flowers, 
 
 Nimbussed, brimming, alert; 
 Touching hands with the East, 
 
 Giving gaze to the West; 
 Flying words and a song 
 
 To the South, to the North ; 
 Gathering, giving, goes 
 
 Over the blossoming world ; 
 Singing the song of the stars. 
 
 Winding the way of delight. 
 Vision of motion hung 
 
 Twixt down-dropped meaning of stars 
 
 And full up-bloom of the earth; 
 Set asway to the tune 
 
 Of the lavish graces of girls; 
 
 Fair as a sea-foam flower 
 In-blown to the sweet-rooted earth. 
 
 But tanged by the scent of the sea; 
 
 Tresses of billowy bronze 
 Held as you hold a bird 
 
 Back by the wings from flight; 
 Eyes of eternal mirth 
 
 Touched with the largened glow 
 Of a deserted star; 
 
 Face out of wan star-gloom, 
 Contour curved as a shell. 
 
 Pearl bloomed, by the dream 
 Of sea-swayed mysteries. 
 13 
 
There, as she halts half-aVing, 
 Love leans down to enfold her, 
 
 Out of the soft-housed winds 
 Reaches arms to uplift her 
 
 High to undying height. 
 She, Primavera the maid. 
 
 Loth to leave or to linger, 
 Pauses with scarce-touching feet 
 
 On the delicate crest of the bloom. 
 
 Spring in the upward flight 
 
 Of a song-throated lark to the sky! 
 Maid alit for a breath 
 
 To break anew into flight! — 
 Two ephemeral dreams 
 
 Touching their ecstasy; 
 And the earth caught between, — 
 
 Pressed till it overbrims 
 With blossom and leaf and song. 
 
 Fair is the vernal vision, 
 Sudden as shadow of heaven. 
 
 Catching our breath we lean 
 Forward to treasure its substance — 
 
 Ah ! to the bosom eternal 
 Soon it is ravished away, 
 
 Kept for its coming again 
 Rejuvenescent. 
 
 14 
 
AT PERUGIA. REVERIE 
 
 From here the whole of Umbria mates the sea 
 With wonder of Its hills of heavenly blue; 
 Which in the annals of old Umbrian art 
 Lie caught and live in lovely effigy. 
 Fruitful against the sea the dark earth lies 
 All given o'er to pastoral intent. 
 Upon the far-off hills the small white oxen 
 Daintily tread. Within the level plains 
 The breed of larger gray with widened horns 
 In quiet strength their ancient burden draw 
 In harmony with earth. Upon the slopes 
 The flocks of brown sheep bend toward the her- 
 bage 
 To graze and move like shapes of things in dreams. 
 Tender the winds that fan the peaceful toilers 
 Moving in quiet grace about their task 
 Of training vines around the small bared trees. 
 Over the deepening valleys, plains and hills, 
 The white roads wind in peace amid the fields 
 That lie sea-deep In lovely harvestings. 
 Afar the pallid cities cling like shades 
 Against the mountains. All the land between 
 Is decked with low-hung arches of the vine, 
 And hedges brushed with bloom can barely hold 
 The light-winged ecstasies of wooing birds. 
 
 Amid the surging loveliness of Spring 
 The broken towers of the city seem 
 Like birdless nests in winter branches bare; 
 And, set In strength, the old Etruscan arches 
 Gaze and gaze upon their vanished dream, 
 
 15 
 
These are your hills, oh men of burled days ! > 
 Yours, though ye be not here with lordly step 
 
 Stamping your own ! They speak in gentle tongue | 
 
 Which once were scarred and branded by your i 
 
 brawls ! i 
 I see ye yet among them, men of old ! 
 
 Out of the cloistered ages of the past \ 
 
 Ye stare like aliens ! Not even death | 
 
 Could conquer, quite, such lives. Its bonds are i 
 
 frail i 
 
 To hold such molten spirits, or to crush ■ 
 Those wills that dared defiance to the world. 
 
 Over your parapets of stone I lean, \ 
 
 And let my sight have happy mastery \ 
 
 Of fair, unravished Umbrian loveliness. \ 
 Even here ye once were wont to lean 
 
 And gaze upon the far, unconscious towns \ 
 
 Like hawks upon a gray meek-breasted dove, \ 
 
 Until your sight grew hot with your desire. ' 
 
 Then ye might never cease until ye won ] 
 Homage abject, possessed the lovely town 
 
 Whether Assisi, Foligno, Spoleto, > 
 
 Gubbio, Siena — stilling their dumb cries i 
 
 With your long hands of war. \ 
 
 \ 
 
 Or else ye mark | 
 
 Beyond the hidden hills a brother brood J 
 
 Return from banishment. The exiled lords ) 
 Return ! Ye spy them yet afar, that come 
 
 To match the setting sun its gorgeous hues ^ 
 With their assembled splendor. Slowly they wind 
 
 Out of disfavored darkness, across the plains, \ 
 
 i6 i 
 
The gracious sunned and shadowed Umbria, 
 
 Up the hushed slope, beneath your downward gaze. 
 
 Their way to long-awaited victory. 
 
 But ever under surface of success 
 
 Surged the deep sea of passions never quelled; 
 
 And each in turn astride on fortune's crest 
 
 Plunged to disaster. Hark ye to the next! 
 
 The lords in turn lie dreaming all too long, 
 Until their dream Is shattered and its light 
 Is shed upon the morning of their foe! 
 Long hid in barren nests and wind-roofed places 
 Kneading and gathering forces of strong men. 
 The men of common mould used well the years 
 To make their leader, so to lead them home. 
 The dreaming lords awake ! The fierce town rings 
 With fighting cries, and down and down they 
 
 swoop 
 Like winds to sweep all opposition by. 
 In vain, ye victims of relentless change ! 
 The very winds that swept you to a deed 
 Went over you and onward to new zones. 
 As well for you to bide and mend your wounds 
 Till with new daring you arose and caught 
 The pinions of new winds to carry you ! 
 
 Makers and marrers ! Too oft your eerie nest. 
 Though set within Its battlements of stone. 
 Was shaken by your flaming passions breath. 
 The annals weary with your fruitless fights ! 
 Is there no other note? Aye, here it reads: 
 The gay child-hearts of ye that sang aloud 
 Along the ages gray with history. 
 
 17 
 
'TIs here we learn from you ! Ye wore delight 
 
 Of earth and waking hearts as flower-wreaths 
 
 To grace the feast of life; nor let the weight 
 
 Of evils smother your glad-running step. 
 
 I see your feasts, that sprang to utterance 
 
 In joyful banners, silken, crested, swung 
 
 'Neath winds of daring splendor; in arches 
 
 wrought 
 Into their form by daring artist hands, 
 And set with capstone, quivering to the heights ! 
 Delicate flowers held in bands of scent. 
 Withstanding death until a farther morn 
 That they might hang the world with garlands. 
 
 Spears, 
 Subdued to peace, couched dumb; and armors' 
 
 clang 
 Renounced its harsh reverberating voice 
 To take on muffled, dulcet harmonies. 
 Fierceness, clad in garment of content. 
 Embraced the beauty of the captured hour 
 Like an all-amorous hawk who bends him down 
 To feel his blood unfevered running clear 
 And lets his hot touch cool among the calms 
 Of pleasure. Full the vintaged wines gushed forth 
 From jewelled fountains into goblets chased 
 By artisans with soul for pencil point. 
 Golden speeches ran rare answers up 
 To lift more silvery laughter, till the sky 
 Leaned down to draw the music to its depth. 
 Brave-floating plumes topped rich habiliments 
 With pride of motion; caught the flowing sun; 
 Dared the winds, and nodded gayly past. 
 Pearls, thickly sewn as stars In firmament, 
 
 l8 
 
Bedecked the dark-haired daughters of the land 
 From whence shown out their own true beings' 
 
 worth 
 In voice, in eyes, in wild, sequestered heart. 
 A sumptuous beauty theirs, close held within 
 The cup of carven lineage proudly high 
 At whose enchiselled brim the fire welled 
 Unspilled. Endowed the maidens walked 
 With hidden graces harbored as deep gold 
 All latticed-windowed; till the ripened hour 
 Called them to laughter, bloom and lavishment. 
 For these the dark stones of Perugia lay 
 Hidden beneath a wilderness of boughs 
 Uprooted from the nursery of spring 
 And fetched, all full of scent and vernal green, 
 With lightest carol, thus to grace the town. 
 
 What mattered ye the shadows o'er your feast? 
 Whether the sudden treacheries that leapt 
 Out of envious hearts to smite your joy; 
 Or malice, or despair made black enough 
 To deal its poison ; or the gaudy show 
 Of powers and potentates that spun ye round 
 With web of some disastrous loveliness 
 By their bright goings mid your festivals; 
 What mattered ye? The song was in your hearts. 
 Your life was in the song. And all your battle- 
 ments 
 Put off their memories of war. They, too. 
 Sprang into singing ! 
 
 But, stranger marvel yet. 
 Days were when halcyon lulls o'ercame your moods 
 
 19 
 
With tender yearning toward dove-like calls 
 That fluted o'er your wars. Then would ye cease 
 Your hawk-like flights and quarrelings, to watch 
 From these same parapets, the mediant forms 
 Of men of peace, whose holy radiance went 
 Like breath of roses o'er your spirits wounds; 
 Aye, overflooded all the factioned world 
 With singing of sweet wonder, which so filled 
 The ears of men with heavenly ravishment 
 They held mute faces up for purity. 
 Ye loved and nurtured that immortal plot 
 Of spiritual green which ran like light 
 Out of the gray-worn convent solitudes, 
 Under the burning gaze of splendid thrones, 
 When creeds were crushed 'neath mitres august 
 
 sway. 
 Ran, and grew gay with radiant little flowers 
 All water-fed with mercy, joy and love. 
 Marvellous little plot ! its sweet endowment 
 Drew ye to grace and bended knees, my wolves, 
 And hallowed your stained natures. 
 
 I fold the close-writ scroll. Such were ye 
 Lords and slaves within yourselves as we, — 
 May be more splendid, more of primal force. 
 Awaking from the darkness of the past 
 With too great heritage, and turning spendthrift; 
 Lavishing your force, your passions, colors. 
 Thoughts, desires, until yourselves and earth 
 Were drained of life, and all the worn-out world 
 Cried mercy. Now when all that splendid tide 
 Has ebbed, we walk upon the shore and prize 
 Each bit of wreckage as a monument. 
 
 20 
 
INVOCATION 
 
 Be near me, Spirit of Eternal Beauty! Stay- 
 Not far, with resting wings upon the outer air; 
 Where, in thine ineffable presence of pure prayer, 
 The gathering heaviness of life must lift away. 
 
 Such moments come when mortals, under own 
 
 stress 
 Oft too intense perception, feel a keen distress; 
 When loveliness is pain which, scaling ever higher, 
 Draws the spirit through divine refining fire. 
 
 When it touches at the morn of high insight, 
 Alight as is a branch with weight of crowning 
 
 bloom, 
 Too frail, too faint, it falls beneath its own delight 
 Back into the bonds of long-used doom. 
 
 Then leaning o'er the bars to breathe unprisoned 
 
 air. 
 Oh, then it finds Thee waiting, invisible and rare ! 
 Mystic Consolation, Revealing Visitor, 
 Unbodied Essence, souls' strange Progenitor! 
 
 It meets thy spiritual gaze across the deep 
 Translucent area of mooned and scented dark; 
 It feels thy pinion's breath across the windless 
 
 steep. 
 Before thy voice its intuitions hark. 
 
 Thy touch of calm forbids its further pilgrimage, 
 Thou pausest at its eager hope of heritage. 
 Then, as a bending mother whose little child is 
 stilled, 
 
 21 
 
Thou leavest with thy mystery of mission unful- 
 filled. 
 
 Oh, tell me, most immeasurable Being! — Thou, 
 Through my closed lids whom I so well see, 
 Are we only dreamers vouchsafed a dream of Thee 
 Which temporally aureoles our spirit-brow? 
 
 Must our fainting hands at death let fall forever 
 All the garnered beauty, all the vainly sought? 
 Frail flesh at failing the sweet links dissever 
 Binding sense and spirit In immortal thought? 
 
 Sweep thou thine answer through the waiting 
 
 strings 
 Of my harp soul; then with eternal hand 
 Touch It again to silence ! May be I understand 
 And hold the prescience of immortal things. 
 
 22 
 
HERMIT THRUSH 
 
 Upon the timeless hour, deep and still, 
 When lesser song-birds seek their early nests, 
 Far off adown the solemn aisles of air 
 
 The vibrant tones are heard 
 
 Which thou, oh hermit bird, 
 Consumatest by melodious care, 
 With exquisitely slow and long-drawn rests 
 Between each finely-modulated trill. 
 
 The tempered ocean's ever-measuring roll 
 Remains in far abeyance from the shore; 
 Down-fallen all the wind's unsheaved hoard 
 
 Into a murmurous sound 
 
 Along the odorous ground; 
 When high from templed pine thou dost abroad 
 Thy store of beauty lavishly outpour 
 From the scarce sung recesses of thy soul. 
 
 Doth the chaste temple of the moon contain, 
 Imprisoned, thine enchanted spirit mate. 
 Whose amber buried shape so faintly seen 
 
 Wakens your lyric quest? 
 
 Ah, woodland dreaming breast ! 
 How camest thou by such yearning art to wean, 
 Here where the sea-crests break the rock by hate, 
 Their goal through virile mastery to gain? 
 
 Oh, hermit, while thy wooing doth unfurl 
 Its lyric sweetness o'er this chosen hour, 
 The wide earth waits in quite ecstasy 
 
 Before thy treasured throat, 
 
 Each golden-measured note 
 
 23 
 
Sinks in its bosom as a pearl down sea, 
 Caught by a water queen within her bower 
 And hostaged in a wave-swayed curl. 
 
 Canst take my heart as jewel casket, say, 
 
 So when the solitary days are drear 
 
 And I no more may hold nor hallow them 
 
 With glory that is gone, 
 
 Thou pricelessly singst on 
 This mythic sun-god's million-rippled gem. 
 And leadest me on to touch with vision clear 
 The treasured thought of this immortal day? 
 
 Thy song unlooseth prisoned memories 
 Of far-off morning forests where I met, 
 Propitiant at haunted fairy rings. 
 
 Deer's eyes across the gloom; 
 
 And set my lyric bloom 
 In dreams companioned by love murmurings 
 On morning hillsides fragrance-filled and wet 
 With lingering dews and fresh with minstrelsies. 
 
 Hast ever sung in such brown beechen grove, 
 Enriched with olden dignity and deep 
 In sunken aeons of dark leaved soil. 
 
 Where footstep falls across 
 
 Successive knolls of moss 
 Outbroken softly under bloomy spoil 
 Of delicatest ferns that waving keep 
 All cool the hanging lillies of our love? 
 
 Oh bird of singing, lovest thou this land 
 Whose vastness overweighs thy tender flight? 
 
 24 
 
Doth the far-boasted freedom of the air 
 
 Give promised buoyancy? 
 
 Or lacks It not to thee 
 Of primal splendor thy long-promised share? 
 Nor suffers not thy virginal delight 
 For old world touch of nature's time-stalned 
 wand? 
 
 I miss the faggot-gatherers old and dear, 
 Who lean to earth with bent and weary back, 
 Yet leave the woodland blest beyond their ken 
 
 With aura of that dome 
 
 Which hallowed them, when home 
 With humble pittance they return again 
 In after-glow of beauty. Alas the lack 
 Of all such humble forest-beauty here f 
 
 The happy woodsman by his haunted stream, 
 The springing jodel of ebullient hearts 
 From hill to hill ; the Invisible hands 
 
 Of brotherhood twixt nature 
 
 And every leaping creature ; — 
 All clothed beliefs of those sweet, haunted lands 
 Where Inner sense of beauty's truth Imparts 
 A reverence to man's eternal dreams. 
 
 Soon when the summer, ripening to Its goal, 
 Lies richly caught amid yon bed of grasses, 
 Or blown Into a level flare of light 
 
 Along the mown leas. 
 
 Or sunk In low-marsh seas. 
 Thou wilt away upon thy stayless flight. 
 Bequeathing me thy wonder-song which passes 
 In long-continuing echo through the soul. 
 
 as 
 
I know I must arise with garment fold 
 
 A-trail with potency of buried song 
 
 Whose richness yet enthralls ; must see my earth 
 
 In her own beauty drest; 
 
 Must still my dreaming breast 
 Of imaged wonders lest I miss the birth 
 Of vernal vision; lest these valleys throng 
 With shy-brought gifts mine eyes may not behold. 
 
 Then, come the Summer and thy song once more, 
 I meet its sweetness with a spirit grown 
 In measure of high reach that seeks to take 
 
 Gifts of the golden past 
 
 Into this region vast; 
 Singing the while I weave them In the wake 
 Of vanished languor, or lift them to be blown 
 As shells upon my great sea-wondering shore. 
 
 26 
 
THE FUCHSIA'S PROPHESY 
 
 As were my vision like a pool 
 
 In paradisial place, 
 Its quiet depth perpetuates 
 
 Their clear-hung mirrored grace. 
 
 They follow me, their shadow 
 
 Falls soft on everything. 
 The faintest ghosts from fairy world 
 
 That need remembering ! 
 
 Oh, pale and crimson prophesy, 
 
 A touch for either lid ! 
 Reveal the world of waiting dreams 
 
 That veil of weeping hid ! 
 
 ''By a lone shore with friends in grief 
 Fond-leaning heart with heart 
 
 You find, their tear-enshadowed tomb, 
 Our cluster fallen athwart.'^ 
 
 ''Or lying clasped in beggar arms 
 
 We by our beauty woo 
 A tender change; for what you give 
 
 Ourselves are offered you!^ 
 
 Oh sweet enchantful prophesy. 
 Thy pale and crimson tone 
 
 Proclaims a light upon my way 
 I had thought fall'n and gone ! 
 
 27 
 
*Y« needle hours, when close you sit 
 
 Lap-fulled with broideries, 
 Your Mother leans to watch our birth 
 
 Beneath your finders rise J* 
 
 ^'Yoiir Father, resting through the eve 
 
 Within your bower-room, 
 Enlingers near the casement bright 
 
 As a bee o^er our bloom.'' 
 
 Oh, pale and crimson prophesy! 
 
 Such hours of grace for me 
 My bleeding heart of bitterness 
 
 Bind with humility ! 
 
 *^When we soft-knotted in with grace, 
 Upon your bride-breast lay. 
 
 Your lover's lips will lean to kiss 
 Our crimson hearts away." 
 
 *'When he unpins us from your breast 
 
 To loose the happy fold. 
 Our troubled ghosts are mirrored new 
 
 Within his heart of gold." 
 
 Thou purple-gloried prophesy, 
 Fold up your arras bright; 
 
 My faltering lids may not endure 
 Their sacred Inner sight. 
 
 28 
 
THE RIVER-PATH 
 
 I watch thee lead the people forth 
 Beneath the daylight dawtning, 
 
 And draw them back when quiet eve 
 Descends with silent warning. 
 
 The man with latent strength renewed, 
 The child with soft locks braided, 
 
 Young lads and maids with love-ways crude, 
 And mothers early jaded. 
 
 All pass beyond the distant hill 
 
 Which hides their ways from me; 
 
 I weave their humble tales until 
 The night falls gradually. 
 
 Then lo, they come by groups, in rows, 
 
 Or solitary wending, 
 While every one among them knows 
 
 Some hand their hearth is tending. 
 
 Oh Way, lead out the wide world over 
 
 Where lonely farers roam ! 
 Oh, tender Path beside the river, 
 
 Lead thou my lover home I 
 
 29 
 
THE GLEANER 
 
 I left my lover at the town 
 
 And swiftly went away 
 To wander seeking, up and down, 
 
 For one last summer day. 
 
 I sought It, I found it, 
 I listened close and long; 
 
 I reaped It, I bound It 
 Into a sheaf of song. 
 
 At evening, with the falling moon. 
 
 To town again I came; 
 And laid It 'gainst my lover's shoon 
 
 With a kiss of flame. 
 
 30 
 
STARS 
 
 Night I saw a golden star, 
 
 Morn I saw none; 
 Where between the night and morn 
 
 Has the bright star gone? 
 
 Star-Hke my lover came, 
 
 Shining on my soul; 
 Wondrous as a star he went 
 
 To a veiled goal. 
 
 Heaven holds no morning star 
 
 Lighted 'til the even; 
 Hearts holds Love, through morn and eve, 
 
 High in her heaven. 
 
 31 
 
THE HARPER 
 
 The lonely land, the lone land 
 
 That's set amid gray hosts of seas! 
 
 Oh. I am In the lonely land 
 
 Whose eaves adrip with memories ! 
 
 Would a song come by East or West, 
 It's 1 would set my harp atune : 
 
 Or. shaken from the white-throat North, 
 Aye me I Ed meet and greet the boon! 
 
 Would a soft word blow up the South, 
 Breaker of all my lonely woe, 
 
 To the Love-land to the South Strand 
 Its down Ed drop my harp and go ! 
 
 32 
 
SONG: THE DESIROUS 
 
 Oh would I were the sun, 
 
 To flood thy heart with light, 
 
 So when the day were done 
 
 Thou wouldst regret my flight! 
 
 Or were I but the air, love, 
 To give thee sweetest breath, 
 
 I could not from my darling move 
 Lest I should give thee death. 
 
 Yet were I but Life's shadow, 
 To creep into thy heart, 
 
 Of all thy secret thought 
 Ed be a very part. 
 
 33 
 
PATTERANS 
 
 Crossed boughs of leafy green I lay 
 
 Along the verge of spring; 
 The secret sign, that shows the way 
 
 For your remembering. 
 
 Crossed boughs of still, autumnal leaves 
 
 I weave at closing year; 
 Though thy heart hear the wind that grieves, 
 
 Thine eyes will read it clear. 
 
 Farewell ! until my faltering path 
 
 No longer leads alone; 
 When all its strayed direction hath 
 
 Grown blended with thine own ! 
 
 34 
 
HIDDEN MEADOW : 
 
 Away from river and shore, \ 
 
 Alight with shimmer and sun, : 
 
 I go by a secret path i 
 
 Which leads in a wanton course; j 
 
 Now over the open fields, j 
 
 Wild as a leaping hare ! 
 
 Bound for covert afar, j 
 
 Now into the deep retreat | 
 
 Of the cloistered trees in the woodland, j 
 
 "Coming, coming," I cry ', 
 
 Unto the Hidden Meadow. j 
 
 Oifily a field to finish — \ 
 
 Field where the riotous sun ' 
 Spawns and spreads his splendor 
 
 Over the grasses mown. I 
 
 Hark! a young bird cries, j 
 
 Seeking his buried nest; j 
 
 A heart's call for his mate, | 
 
 And I answer with a call. i 
 
 Soon the wings of the distance | 
 
 Will fold away from my vision, [ 
 And I and my heart will be left 
 Alone in the midst of the meadow. 
 Hark ! a stir in the leaves, 
 In the hedge beyond the clover 
 Near the wild path whence I came! 
 
 Is there coming another { 
 Into this field of my own. 
 
 Some other dreamer and rover i 
 
 Ready to claim and to take ? I 
 Shy of my secret I stand; 
 
 35 \ 
 
Sure as a thief I must be, 
 
 Or a miser over his store. i 
 
 Hush ! it Is close at hand ! 'i 
 
 .< 
 Here is the old gray barn \ 
 
 I remember so long ago. 
 Silent and still It stands, 
 A sentinel to warn 
 Wanderers. Ah, me ! 
 
 Gray old barn of the past, ■• 
 
 Still have you stood all these years ^ 
 
 Steadfast and growing to beauty, j 
 
 Gathering gifts from the seasons, vj 
 
 Color and contour and tone. 
 These the Innate, the eternal, ■ 
 
 Gradually given, bestowed 
 
 Out of the plenum of beauty. \ 
 
 Let me come unto thy temple 
 In silence and meekness and love ! 
 Nought have I gathered nor garnered; 
 Nothing I touched or attained 
 Stayed with me. All was fleeting. 
 Dream and shadow of dream. ; 
 
 Ever their forms elusive ^ 
 
 Bent to me, touched and departed. 
 Far and fair were they then, \ 
 
 Fair and far are they now, \ 
 
 Dream and shadow of dream ! ' 
 
 Had I mated them with my will j 
 
 Chance they had stayed to reveal, i 
 
 Nested and brooded and borne. 
 Then, on their wings I had flown \ 
 
 36 i 
 
Out of this limit of self 
 Through to empirical realms. 
 
 Now to thee, Silent and Faithful, 
 
 Temple and Altar abiding, 
 
 Back from the call of the distance, 
 
 Back from the wide earth's wonder. 
 
 By the same little path of yore 
 
 That leads through the broken woodland 
 
 Into the Hidden Meadow, 
 
 I come, I stand, I return. 
 
 Let me receive from thee 
 
 Some of thy wisdom of being! 
 
 Wilful thinking and acting 
 
 And mere wander-love to renounce. 
 
 Only to stand and to be 
 
 In quiet, unquestioning wisdom 
 
 Restful, content and profound! 
 
 37 
 
<^lv 
 
 THE PEAR TREE IN BLOSSOM. 
 
 It glistens in bridal brightness, 
 Bedecked with gems of the sun; 
 
 With golden promise of fruitage 
 Blossom and bough are spun. 
 
 It pales in the air of the evening, 
 
 Weighted with revery. 
 Veiling itself as a maiden 
 
 With bridal modesty. 
 
 Then, deep in the darkness enfolded. 
 
 It dreams of a distant frost. 
 The bridegroom beneath whose caresses 
 
 Its beauty forever is lost. 
 
 38 
 
HALF LIGHT 
 
 Over my morning garden fell 
 A slender shadow — I loved It well; 
 But under the gradual glare of day 
 The tender shadow vanished away. 
 
 At night again, when the moon rose high, 
 From the dreaming casement I could descry, 
 Shy as a fawn on the silvery plain 
 The delicate shadow had come again. 
 
 39 
 
'TIN AL MARINA^' 
 
 I passed an amber villa set on high 
 Above the breaking music of the sea, 
 
 Within a realm of sun and cloudless sky, 
 Upon the crest of a declivity. 
 
 Half cinctured by cool cypress to the south. 
 To keep the untempered sun from breaking 
 through. 
 
 All free with silvery olives to the north 
 That courted openly the sun's full view. 
 
 Shadow and sun thus graciously combined 
 To lay their gifts before the golden door. 
 
 Where hidden lovers held their lives enshrined 
 Within a dream of beauty evermore. 
 
 40 
 
TWO GARDENS 
 
 One overhung with sense of dreams still sleeping 
 Beneath the breath of lilies past their bloom, 
 
 A vigil through unawakened seasons keeping 
 For some heard echo of predestined doom. 
 
 One clearly offering its cool embrasure 
 To vernal gifts of buds and melodies, 
 
 Awake to welcome each appropriate pleasure 
 That falls from golden leaved futurities. 
 
 And neither of the other's nearness guessing. 
 Because of leaf-enshadowed walls between. 
 
 But, unawares, a mutual sky possessing. 
 And one eve-star, empatronal, serene. 
 
 41 
 
WATER FETE 
 
 From the areas of evening 
 Fell a sudden fairy dream, 
 
 Laughing lights and hidden music, 
 Jewelled boats upon the stream. 
 
 Past the bank of sombre pine trees. 
 O'er the dark and quiet river, 
 
 Floats the laughing, lighted image 
 On and past and out forever. 
 
 42 
 
AN EGYPTIAN TOMB i 
 I 
 
 We watched the far Nile's beauty opaline 
 
 Until Its last gleam vanished ; then we turned ] 
 Toward the sands. There at thine entrance Thou, | 
 
 Oh Desert haunted by Divinity, j 
 
 Didst take our hearts, and gavest to our sight 1 
 
 Thy long, low-couching vision that runs free ] 
 To full horizon. Our thoughts became thy vestals. | 
 Our feet were sandalled with thine awe that stills i 
 
 The outer world to unreality; i 
 
 And set to kingly rhythm upon thy high j 
 
 White plains that He In bondage to the sun. ; 
 
 The desert tidal wave with silent sweep l 
 O'erwhelmed our spirit with a strange enchant- i 
 
 ment ; ] 
 
 And soon we entered Into the white blaze | 
 
 Which is the raiment of that princely realm, \ 
 
 The Valley of the Kings. Long amber cliffs | 
 
 O'er which the mingling lights fell mazefully, j 
 
 Reached out their sinuous length to draw us in ; 
 
 Between their oracled recesses. | 
 
 Day after day we took this burning route ] 
 
 From river westward o'er the golden sands ] 
 
 Toward the old necropolis of Kings. j 
 
 And day by day we learned to worship more j 
 
 The strange miraculous beauty of the realm — j 
 
 Those tides of color, moving ebb and full, j 
 
 From amethystine hues of shadeless day, I 
 To gradual flood and surge of rose at eve, 
 
 Over the vast and desolate solitude. \ 
 
 43 
 
Far down the valley echoed the unseen 
 Chorus of boys, one high voice shrilly leading, 
 Others in sullen answer. Then the sight 
 That might have been a Pharaoh's lofty way 
 To level mountains for his monuments. 
 Under the amber cliffs, like shadows clinging, 
 Worked the gaunt Arabs, clad in flowing robes 
 Of inappropriate grace and wielding slow 
 The same small instruments of olden days. 
 A line of brown boy children, scantly robed. 
 Sang as they gathered loosened rock and drift 
 Into their shallow baskets which they bore 
 Away upon their heads with singing gait. 
 
 One day the workers saw us still afar. 
 And, running forth with inarticulate cries, 
 Brought us to where, fresh cleared from muffling 
 
 sands. 
 There lay a rough-hewn flight of old worn stone. 
 It was as if a voice rang suddenly 
 Out of the tombs, and smote against our hearts; 
 Then silent, held us hushed in deeper awe, 
 
 II 
 
 By feeble candle light 
 The tunnel lead us downward through the dark. 
 Intently creeping, fearful yet to move 
 Further with each awed step, we reached a wall 
 Built well of brick by those last laborers 
 Who this walled In, upon a long-aged day 
 The sacred burial. Here the priestly seal, 
 Last human touch, unbroken met our eyes — 
 Quiet Anubis couching his slim form 
 Above bound rows of prisoners, with gaze 
 
 44 
 
Set long In watching the eternal doors. 
 And near, a rude stone bowl held still the clay 
 With which the priest had sealed the dumb abode. 
 The wall, half wrecked by thieves who long ago 
 Ravished the fair virginity of death. 
 Betrayed a nestled brood within the gloom. 
 Flushed like a flock of birds, a color-cloud 
 Of blue, of ivory, gold, and crimson winged 
 Its sudden unimprisoned way to our amaze. 
 This first swift breath of wonder, how it swept, 
 Silent and sudden over reality 
 Like trickery of magic to the sense ! 
 
 The cave was filled with marvellous array 
 Of funerary gifts beyond all hope 
 Unbroken, exquisite, in actual, last. 
 Untouched position, as the attending hearts 
 Weeping had placed them in the sepulchre. 
 A sea of vases, painted multitudes. 
 Covered the sanded floor; and upright rows 
 Of little shrine-like boxes stood serene, 
 Close-shutting in the strange ushabti forms 
 That waited on the dead in mystic service: — 
 Tillers of everlasting fields, hewers of mild 
 Mere dreamed of forests, drawters of sacred 
 
 waters, — 
 A faithful army, carven by artist hands 
 From lucent alabaster; or stone o'erlaid 
 With shimmering gold; or silver like a cloud 
 In surface soft; or wood of sacred cedar. 
 There in the plenteous midst, all housed around 
 With dear home-offerings whose tender use 
 Still waited through the long unliving years, 
 
 45 
 
Heaped round with marvels lay the mummied j 
 forms j 
 
 Of two who waited their eternity! \ 
 
 We seemed to tread the fabled shore | 
 
 Of some dim underworld! For these were dead, | 
 Long dead, but still they wore the living mask \ 
 
 Of their humanity. They lay exposed I 
 
 In desecrated coffins, still serene. 
 
 Though thieving hands had long since hunted forth i 
 Dear hidden jewels, amulets and charms \ 
 
 Against the terrors of their journey grim. i 
 
 Torn were the wrappings, wrenched at throat and 
 
 breast; A 
 
 Elsewhere the lovely folds of finest cloth J 
 
 Still clung as priestly hands had so minutely 
 Wrapped them down to the delicate finger tips. ', 
 
 In gold emblazoned state, though rudely stirred, - 
 
 The mummies lay, with faces beautiful I 
 
 Like darkened bronze, and long straight forms out- 
 lined 
 Beneath worn cerements. '\ 
 
 The lady of the dead lies quiet here 
 
 As If in her fair home, when soon her will 
 
 Would be to rise and set about her day 
 
 Of gentle doing. Daintily are put 
 
 Things of her finest taste to frame her. High 
 
 And queenly must she be who haunts with grace 
 
 The fragile little sofa, gold embossed. 
 
 And the lady's chairs wait by her quietly 
 
 Devoting unseen beauty to her dreams. 
 
 Near for the lifting of her eager hand 
 
 Her dainty table waits, wherein the tale 
 
 46 
 
Of folded broideries and brooding hours 
 Lies In sweet echo In the enchanted shrine. 
 Near, lies a casket like a blue bird caught 
 And set In the dark to dream of Its own blue 
 Old Egypt wrought of laplslazull 
 Encrusted deep with softly patterned gold. 
 
 There was a most Ineffable soft air 
 Of human pathos haunted that lone room, 
 As If the spirit essayed yet to Inhabit 
 The old familiar tenure of Its days. 
 For the mute things lay brushed with flowery trace 
 Of a dissolving presence. One dimly felt 
 That time, long sealed without, scarce daring yet 
 To touch the breathless verge, still hung aloof 
 Lest the Imprisoned loveliness take wing 
 And leave but crumbling sediment. The gloom 
 Submitted slowly, singly, each new treasure 
 So long held In Its mothering embrace. 
 Low at our feet, half burled In the gloom 
 A vase of ambered alabaster lay. 
 The slender neck swept down Into the bloom 
 Of perfect bowl; the handle curved to frail 
 Twin lotus stems that ran In breathless flight 
 Downward to break into the lotus flower 
 Upon the bowl! To name the rare delight: 
 Is it not Orpheus song, caught Into foam 
 Afloat on gold-shored seas of classic lore? 
 Or think we not of Psyche's finger-tip 
 Holding light-poised a deathless butterfly? 
 Or Hebe exquisitely holding up 
 This chalice to the lips of the pale Gods? 
 We lift it, cool and alabaster clear, 
 
 47 
 
with actual touch, out of the golden gloom \ 
 And straight we feel our hand-clasp with the dead i 
 
 Rivet the strong bonds of humanity. ; 
 
 High piled in ranks the sad meat offerings 
 
 Lay in their ebon boxes still untouched ] 
 
 As when the funerary feast was laid | 
 
 Believingly. Had ever once the spirit I 
 
 Returned to taste the fleshly food it knew? ] 
 
 Once more returned to look upon the face I 
 
 It bore in life? Then soft it came and went, 
 
 And of the needs prepared, whate'er it took ) 
 
 For nourishment departed as it came — ^ •' 
 
 Touchless, unsensed, unbodied, strange and dim. ] 
 
 As if sad little silver-shodden feet I 
 Had come, and at the portal of dark death 
 Slipped off their sandals, these all useless now 
 Lay in mute waiting on the sanded floor. 
 
 And we who held them listened wonderingly j 
 
 To hear, along dim halls of underworld, } 
 
 The passage of those feet that before death ^ 
 
 Walked in them joyfully upon the earth. ; 
 
 Harkening we heard them coming through the 
 
 dark 
 
 All delicate with dews and asphodel, '. 
 
 Brushing with timid step the path that leads J 
 
 To their own last abode, which walls away ] 
 
 All less diaphanous substance. 1 
 
 Come, oh Kaa ! i 
 These are thy things and this thine habitation 
 
 Which death hath not made strange to thee, nor ! 
 
 set '. 
 
 48 . 
 
In ruin. Still, though a shade, thou mayest reclaim 
 The recollection sweet of earth's delights — 
 Comfort, repose, food for thy hunger I See ! 
 Thy chairs, thy bed, and for thine old life-dream- 
 
 ing, 
 This fallen rose, a cushion, softly wove 
 Of finest fibre filled with down. Thy sleep 
 Would be enwrapped with all its olden bliss; 
 To whose invasion soft, relinquishing 
 Thy starved limbs, thou soon woulds't utter low: 
 "Ah bitter is immortality, fair fruit 
 Barren of life's sweet kernel-coating sense ! 
 I sleep, I sink in bliss ephemeral!" 
 
 Thy chariot too is here which drew thee once 
 Toward the confines of thy world, to stand 
 Against thy battle foes. Rememberest thou 
 The swift pang that arose as forth thou sentest 
 Far arrows to the North? Or the proud scorn 
 Which sat within thy breast as, conqueror, 
 Thou sawest bound enemies beneath thy foot 
 That trod the South in splendor? 
 
 In this jar 
 Of heavy alabaster scarce a slave 
 Could carry, yellow and deep thy honied draught 
 Lies liquid yet. 'Tis long since thou hast drank, 
 Else thy fastidious taste had ne'er allowed 
 The little upturned fly so long to lie 
 Upon the amber surface deep within 
 In such appalling insignificance ! 
 'Chance death hath marred thy palate and no more 
 Mayest cool thy throat with honey of warm bees, 
 Or feel thy strange thirst satisfied with draughts 
 
 49 
 
Pictured for thee In thousands of stone jars 
 And numbered on the walls In scores and scores? 
 
 No voice awakes, no stir disturbs the still 
 Inviolate dusk where death so long hath lain 
 Embalmed in Isolation. All is fled! 
 
 Ill 
 
 With solemn eyes we see the dead brought forth, 
 The strangely dead whose human forms still hold 
 The unloosed semblance of a soul once there. 
 They come sore-clad In ancient cerements, 
 Sealed in their slumber with crossed arms of peace. 
 Out once again to their own desert's blaze 
 Whence, buried ages back, they softly went 
 Into their fair wrought sepulchre of dreams. 
 
 Are these your Kings, oh venerable land, 
 
 Who starred your lotus crown with splendid deeds 
 
 When you, alone of all the unborn world 
 
 Lay in full blooming beauty? Are these your 
 
 Kings, 
 Your Pharaohs, whose Immeasurable power 
 Once to each whim held all the world a thrall? 
 
 Nay, these come forth from their eternity 
 
 Not as the God-descended Kings remote, 
 
 But In more gentle and familiar way 
 
 With common aureole of parenthood 
 
 To win our love. They had been more enwrapt 
 
 With filial love than Is the common lot 
 
 Of Kings; for sorrow housed with them and hung 
 
 Mourning about their sepulchre. Each gift 
 
 50 
 
Disclosed a lingering tenderness. Some daughter's 
 
 hand 
 Wrote messages of woe; and twined her gifts ^ 
 
 With scenes of her distress. Some lordly son 
 Tokens of sorrow brought In reverence. ; 
 
 And tears of a lovely queen fell softly once ^ 
 
 Upon this golden burial. \ 
 
 Who are these? ' 
 
 No Kings, though lain amid the Vale of Kings 
 Uncrowned, save by such offering of love. 
 Unsung save in their tomb. Who then are these? 
 
 Go first and gather 'mid the storied queens 
 
 The dearest of them, fabled TiyI, who moved 
 
 As the moon-goddess self, untraced and dim, 
 
 Within the dream-wrapped dynasties of old. 
 
 A stranger to the palace of the King 
 
 She came. The lordly Pharaoh lifted her i 
 
 And set her high in honor over all. | 
 
 "The beloved of the breast of him j 
 
 Who trod the earth In splendor." ''His small ^ 
 
 love" 
 Lingering at his knee In lowliness ; ^ j 
 
 His great queen, sharing his memorials. j 
 
 None knew if she were of dim eastern stem 
 Brought from some house, unsung save by the j 
 harp : 
 
 Of her high beauty. Or with an Idle glance 
 Had the Egyptian Pharaoh looking down \ 
 
 Among his subjects, chosen this one soul, j 
 
 Knowing its rarity? The price of her ^ I 
 
 Was suffering such as wakened thought entails, 
 Bearing the soul it wakes to Isolation. : 
 
 51 I 
 
She fixed their inward vision far beyond 
 
 Its own accustomed close, until in time 
 
 Her young lord son stood out against his realm, 
 
 Uprooted the old faiths and stilted rule 
 
 Of Theban Ra; while her poetic voice 
 
 Breathed to him all her delicate beliefs 
 
 That broke like blossoms through his heart and led 
 
 Him forth to raise new spiritual creed 
 
 In canticle to Aten. Wave of belief too high, 
 
 It ebbed on shores of old Idolatry, 
 
 Leaving the two who called It from the void 
 
 Outcast In memory. But through the scarred 
 
 Memorials the fame of TiyI survived. 
 
 Here at this burled shrine she seems to kneel 
 Divested of all mystery and sweet 
 With grieving daughterhood. For in this tomb 
 She hid her parentage. 
 
 Oh Solemn Dead 
 How touchlngly ye come to us, bearing 
 Your names In piteous dignity! We give 
 All honor as we read. Thou loulya, 
 Lord of her beside thee lying low, 
 And parent of her we praise, thy daughter Tlyl; 
 Honored of Kings, holding high offices 
 Of royal steward, Keeper of granaries, 
 Thy King was son to thee, and dear thy head 
 To all the Kingdom. But most dear 
 Through thy great fatherhood to history. 
 
 The mother Touiyou lies in peace beside 
 Her mate through this Strang dream of being 
 dead. 
 
 52 
 
Richly and lovingly her child Inscribed 
 Full wealth of titles writ In delicate bands 
 Across her case of gold. Fair Mother-form 
 Indeed we love thee ! So strangely motherly 
 Thou seemest to us, grim no more the death 
 That floods the centuries between us grey. 
 For out of time's dull waves as a mute dove, 
 Springs thine exultant tenderness ! 
 
 So lay 
 The reverential burden In the blaze 
 Of this same worshipped sunlight, desert pure. 
 Which saw the early panoply of grief 
 Enter this desert lair. Piteous now and full 
 Of a deserted splendor, as a sun 
 Long set and rotting In effulgence, lies 
 This priceless hoard upon the sudden verge 
 Of Its corruption. Wonderful and free 
 Within their long unbroken slumber lie 
 These honored two. Nought now to them 
 Is this rude stirring of their dreams, and nought 
 The wreckage of their sinister abode. 
 
 We fold again 
 The winding sheet of linen, saffron dyed. 
 Whose weave Is beauteous forever; lay 
 The horizontal bands of roseate hue — 
 Two from head to foot and two across — 
 That held the wrappings. Softly we replace 
 The simple necklace of dried bloom upon 
 Their breasts again— blossom it is of sunt 
 Whose sharp scent feeds the gloomy under air 
 Of tombs with breath of sun-hot level fields, 
 
 53 
 
And cools the sleeping thought with fragrant 
 
 dreams. 
 So, lapped by quiet waves of memory 
 That float them ever on Its deathless tide, 
 They may not mourn. Turns now across the sands 
 The sacred file, retracing solemnly 
 Its dim remembered coming long ago. 
 Now may our hands hold faithful stewardship 
 That bring their precious burden back from death 
 And at the world's high altar lay it down. 
 
 54 
 
POET 
 
 As stood Apollo In the lillied dawn 
 With startled lyre, when'as the doom Immense 
 Of Titans lifted him to the Intense 
 
 Experience of godhood newly born; 
 
 So stoodest thou, Poet, In thine early morn, 
 Feeling the keen pain of prophetic sense 
 Flush thy mortality, in recompense 
 
 For earthly loneliness. Thus spirit-born, 
 
 Astray from dreams, we find thine instrument 
 Flight-dropped amid a fairy host of flowers, 
 Enguarding deep within its resonant heart 
 The rare bequest of thine Immortal art; 
 Whence we, as thou e'en didst from heavenly pow- 
 ers. 
 Receive our spiritual sacrament. 
 
 55 
 
RONDEAU 
 
 To Mme. J. 
 
 The lilies In my garden-close 
 
 Are fragrant, fair, and full of grace; 
 
 They range against an azure space 
 Their beauteous blooms in ordered rows. 
 When far the summer season goes 
 
 And leaves my wintered sight no trace 
 Of lilies in my garden-close. 
 
 So fragrant fair, and full of grace; 
 I looked upon my lady's face 
 Where lo ! their vanished radiance glows ; 
 Each variation of her pose 
 
 Through subtle motion doth replace 
 The lilies in my garden-close. 
 
 56 
 
POND LILIES 
 To Lucy W. 
 
 Within the water's shallow glare 
 White shade you weave, Pond Lily; 
 
 A wonder-cup of woodland share 
 Your crowned head, Pond Lily! 
 
 Within the labyrinth of days, 
 
 White threads you weave, Pond Lily; 
 And all who near your broidered maze 
 
 See clear at eve, Pond Lily ! 
 
 57 
 
YOUTH 
 To Theo 
 
 All the world is empty, | 
 
 My delight is gone; ] 
 
 Starless comes the evening, 
 Sunless goes the morn. 
 
 Light of heart and foot, | 
 
 He is faring free ) 
 
 Where the young world widens i 
 
 In activity. 1 
 
 \ 
 
 Where the song is singing ; 
 
 He is happiest, : 
 
 Answer to the calling | 
 
 Rises In his breast, i 
 
 And his young joy stamps the rhythm | 
 
 For his feet upon the quest. 
 
 58 
 
MOON-DREAMS 
 
 Shut out the little moon, 
 
 The winds arise, 
 All sweet serenity of gold 
 
 Is blotted from the skies. 
 And all too soon 
 
 Her fairy reign is told — 
 Shut out the little moon. 
 
 Shut out the little dreams, 
 
 For life is here 
 To bid us loosen from our grasp 
 
 The treasures that our hearts hold dear, 
 The golden beams 
 
 Our eager hands would clasp — 
 Shut out the little dreams. 
 
 59 
 
HOPE'S YEAR 
 
 Lightly in the springtime, 
 
 Up the leafy slope, 
 Sped the winged maiden — 
 
 Silver-cinctured Hope. 
 
 Joyful on the levels. 
 
 Summer-long she played; 
 
 Till the scythe of harvest 
 To the bloom was laid. 
 
 Downward through the autumn 
 Went in solemn ways. 
 
 With a purple shadow 
 Sorrowing her gaze. 
 
 As the snows engulfed her. 
 North and east and west, 
 
 Held eternal embers 
 
 Banked within her breast. 
 
 60 
 
AUTUMN UNDERTONE 
 
 Silvery shallows slipping along, 
 Tender and low is your evening song; 
 Birds on your bordering glades are still, 
 Light has gone from the low, green hill, 
 Fallen the petals of wild, sweet roses, 
 Shadows shorten and summer closes. 
 
 Little, slim shallows, sweet and clear. 
 Ye ripple on, in the autumn drear. 
 Strong is the law that ye obey, 
 Not to vary, and not to stay. 
 The seasons fall from the waning shore, 
 The sound of the bird Is heard no more; 
 But the force of the law doth ever abide 
 In the rhythmic flow of the faithful tide. 
 
 6i 
 
THREE PRAYERS 
 
 Mary, maiden Mary, may T make my praise to thee 
 While I weave a chaplet of the days that are to be? 
 
 Maid of mercy, pure within. 
 
 Grant me gladness without sin ; 
 
 While the world is fair and gay 
 
 Walk with me upon the way. 
 Maiden Mary, kiss my soul to thine own purity! 
 
 Mary, Mother Mary, take my gift of womanhood. 
 Lean to me and hold me in a holy sisterhood ! 
 
 Spirit-led and passion-willed, 
 
 To the realm of love fulfilled 
 
 Lo ! I come and proudly claim 
 
 Woman's crown in thy name. 
 Mother Mary, grant me all thy grace of pleni- 
 tude ! 
 
 Mary, Martyr Mary, in the hour of my tears 
 Stoop and cleanse my spirit from its heritance of 
 fears. 
 
 Touch me with thy holy sense 
 
 Of sorrow's deep munificence, 
 
 Bind for me mine earthly eyes 
 
 That I may see paradise 
 Rise a flowery vision through the vista of the years ! 
 
 62 
 
SISTER WINGS 
 
 Wild birds, fly to me 
 
 Out of the high sky ; 
 Wild birds, cry to me 
 
 As ye pass by! 
 
 Ye brush o'er the quiet meadow 
 Out on your way to the sea; 
 
 Whither fare ye, sweeping 
 Over the meadow and me ? 
 
 Wings, oh wings of yearning. 
 Call to your hidden mate 
 
 Deep In my bosom dwelling; 
 Oh wings of yearning, wait! 
 
 But on In the shadowy evening. 
 Out to the shoreless deep. 
 
 Ever aloof o'er the quiet earth 
 Ye silently onward sweep. 
 
 Wild birds, carry me 
 
 On your wild flight! 
 Wild birds, marry me 
 
 To Heaven's height! 
 
 63 
 
TRANSMUTATION. j 
 
 Fires die down at night | 
 
 That flamed all day; | 
 
 Thoughts, too, sink into sleep \ 
 
 Like ashes gray. ; 
 
 Gray, but alert for dawn j 
 
 New risen and rosy, | 
 
 When fire and thought, reborn, \ 
 Flush a faint posy. 
 
 All through aerial time '\ 
 
 Dark and light intermingle ; | 
 
 No shade of grief or joy j 
 
 Goes unspun and single 1 \ 
 
 64 
 
WHOxM HE LOVETH 
 
 Of tears and anguishes and ills 
 
 God's hand solicitous 
 With intuition sure distils 
 
 A spirit-draught for us. 
 
 Our songs and laughters and delights 
 
 Are happy sparks that fly 
 Beneath the smiting hammer-strokes 
 
 God's hand too doth apply. 
 
 'Tis now of weal and nowi of woe 
 
 Our portion yet must be; 
 For so God's hand shapes strong and slow 
 
 Our soul's infinity. 
 
 65 
 
INNER PEACE 
 
 How sweet the summer winds that pass 
 
 Melodiously through 
 The straight-rowed orchard's cooling aisles 
 
 From fount of endless blue ! 
 
 The sheared sheep here wander by 
 
 In noontide idleness, 
 With choice of equal sun and shade 
 
 Each gentle mood to bless. 
 
 Their simple lives well-ordered go 
 
 Serene from field to fold, 
 Nor ever bird or star aloft 
 
 Do their dim eyes behold. 
 
 And looking on the gentle scene 
 
 Our lives engrossing cares 
 Sink into their proportioned place 
 
 And leave us nature's heirs. 
 
 66 
 
THE CAMEL-DRIVER 
 
 In the glaring noon 
 
 I hear him croon 
 A quavering rhythmic chant; 
 
 I see him swing 
 
 Like a witless thing 
 On the camel's hump aslant. 
 
 Riding high 
 
 'Neath a burning sky 
 He dreams of the palm-shade far; 
 
 And at evening's glow 
 
 His lone thoughts go 
 To the cool of the evening star. 
 
 Never he cares 
 
 For the burden he bears 
 From the desert down to the river; 
 
 While he and his heart 
 
 May live apart 
 In the realm of his dreams forever. 
 
 67 
 
"ARAIGNEE DU SOIR, ESPOIR'* 
 
 "Spinner at silvery loom, 
 
 Strange you should shyly take 
 
 Time of delicate gloom 
 For a fine task's sake ! 
 
 An' you give me a thread tonight 
 Faith, I could fairly spin, 
 Out of Its slender beam, 
 A dazzling woof 
 To the star aloof 
 Deep to Its heart within." 
 Spin, spin, in the pale twilight, 
 Spider and heart d dream! 
 
 The spider ended his task, 
 
 A fabric so frail and clear 
 Scarce through a summer night 
 
 Would its fine mesh wear. 
 
 The lover he wove and wove 
 
 A miracle of song; 
 And set It singing afar. 
 So fine and sweet. 
 To his dear love's feet 
 Ever the evening long. 
 For she to his eyes was the shining star 
 Set in the sky above. 
 
 68 j 
 
BEE SONG 
 
 Yellow bee, yellow bee, 
 Deep honey lover. 
 
 Have you forgotten that 
 Summer Is over? 
 
 You and your winged train 
 
 Linger here all in vain. 
 
 Never to nest again, 
 Improvident rover! 
 
 Once what a joy you had 
 
 In the fair season. 
 When with your duty clear 
 
 Life had a reason ! 
 Now when the flower-bloom 
 Yielded hath unto doom. 
 For you there is no room — 
 
 Staying is treason ! 
 
 Yellow bee, yellow bee. 
 
 Far from me flying, 
 Thou art the emblem of 
 
 Summer a-dying. 
 Golden the shadow cast 
 By all things overpast. 
 Until their track at last 
 Leads homeward skying. 
 
 69 
 
IN TRINITY GARDEN, OXFORD 
 
 Where are your unseen nests, 
 Oh doves of invisible voices? 
 Rear your plumaged throats 
 Out of the branches embrasure 
 Into my vision! 
 
 None of the full trees tell 
 Where your soft breasts lie brooding, 
 Saving the clear-boughed cedar 
 Whose stately branches do honor 
 To guests in the garden. 
 
 Level the fair lawn lies, 
 Meek amid bordering leafage of 
 Lime tree, locust and larch. 
 Slowly the daylight is shortened 
 Under their umbrage. 
 
 Lured by your murmuring notes. 
 Under the ivied darkness 
 A gold eyed, black cat stalks, 
 Haunted by phantoms of vision 
 As we of desire! 
 
 Have ye no answer innate 
 Hid in your ancient language? 
 Oh oracles, hidden above us. 
 Delicate, wise and abiding. 
 Solve our enigma ! 
 
 70 
 
When the late chimes fall faint 
 Adown from the grey-statued tower, 
 Sink ye to feathery rest ; 
 Peace then, oh doves, from your bosoms 
 Blesses the garden. 
 
 71 
 
ERRANT ARTEMIS 
 
 High 
 
 In the sky 
 
 The lonely moon is riding; 
 
 Least 
 
 In the East 
 
 Of all the host abiding. 
 
 Young, 
 
 To be swung 
 
 Within the sphere immense; 
 
 Frail, 
 
 Not to quail 
 
 Before such eminence. 
 
 With a touch 
 
 Of such 
 
 God-endowered grace, 
 
 Emboldening, 
 
 As goldening. 
 
 She rises into space. 
 
 Until 
 
 She doth will 
 
 To poise her young divinity 
 
 Aloft 
 
 In the croft 
 
 Of infinity. 
 
 Ceased 
 
 Hath the feast 
 Among Immortal Peers; 
 72 
 
Bereft, 
 
 When she left 
 
 To seek the open spheres. 
 
 Fain 
 
 They to strain 
 
 Far immortal gaze; 
 
 Afraid 
 
 Lest the maid 
 
 Lose the heavenly ways. 
 
 Far 
 
 As a star 
 
 She attains her quest; 
 
 Then shining, 
 
 As declining. 
 
 She seeks the darkened West; 
 
 Where, 
 
 Glowing fair. 
 
 An earth-child she lies. 
 
 Deep 
 
 In a sleep 
 
 Devoid of memories. 
 
 And dreams 
 
 That she seems, 
 
 From their sight sunken under, 
 
 To smile 
 
 All the while 
 
 At the god's wonder. 
 
 73 
 
TBE WHITE HOUSE GARDEN IN MAY. \ 
 
 All enclosed by a railing high, j 
 
 Under a sapphire evening sky, * 
 
 Lingers a lovely scene, ; 
 Scene that a fairy wand had striven 
 
 To win for a palace in fairy heaven < 
 
 Fit for a fairy queen. '• 
 
 Crowned with the blossoming bushes of May, i 
 Downward the low, little hills survey 
 
 The level of grassy space ] 
 Daintily set in garlands of bloom, 
 
 O'erhung by the larches' dreamy gloom I 
 
 And the willowy wands' young grace. j 
 
 Flowering quince and the bridal wreath j 
 
 Bewilder the air by their mingled breath, I 
 
 And delicate deutzias white, i 
 
 Set like shimmering frost between { 
 
 Sheath-like yuccas of darker green, i 
 
 Leap to a flowering flight. ^ 
 
 Sweet at the tall trees' hidden roots 
 The daffodils and narcissus shoots 
 
 Stand in their frank attire; 
 Looking aloft to the embowering trees 
 Stirred by the young birds faint unease 
 
 Under their song desire. 
 
 74 1 
 
Soft storm clouds of purpurial hue 
 Veil the face of the sun from view; 
 
 MingHng shadow and gleam 
 Flicker and flare in a fairy dance 
 Faint as a garment's waving glance 
 
 In a dissolving dream. 
 
 A fountain, lily-and iris-ringed, 
 Springs as a naiad spirit-winged 
 Forth to the ether away ; 
 Soon again is her form withdrawn 
 Back to the earth by the arms of a faun 
 Tired of piping and play. 
 
 The central spray from its airy wrack 
 Falls in diaphanous motion back. 
 
 Faint on the surface of air; 
 The outer encircling jets are thrown 
 Into the bowl with bubble and moan 
 
 O'erbrimming in fulness there. 
 
 Fair and far through the twilight veil 
 Gleams the enmarbled beauty pale 
 
 Of arch and of colonnade; 
 Where a temple of Grecian art. 
 Simple and pure in whole and in part, 
 
 Is set in the sylvan glade. 
 
 Slow as the exquisite hour glides 
 
 High o'er the heavens the young moon rides 
 
 Stilling the garden to rest; 
 And the burden of sweetness, overflowing, 
 Sinks in a haven beyond its knowing 
 
 Deep in the human breast. 
 75 
 
ODE TO POLYMNIA 
 
 For Pauline R. 
 
 Muse Immortal ! turn thy solemn eyes 
 Adown from thy Parnassian Paradise ! 
 
 Hath not its echo caught thee, 
 This 'passioned wonder of deep melody 
 Now held, now lifted high in ecstasy. 
 
 Like chaliced incense brought thee? 
 
 Oh, hark ! 'round thy celestial abode 
 Thy swaying lilies herald forth her mood 
 
 Who serveth at thy shrine; 
 This maid immortal, child of mortal earth, — 
 Yet ask thy guardian lilies of her worth, 
 
 Oh, Fount of Sound Divine ! 
 
 They herald her who, worshipping thy wonder. 
 Grew tranced and went uplifted as one under 
 
 Thy gracious stigmata; 
 Since when she moves among us ministrant. 
 Yet ever stands with hands propitiant 
 
 Before thy flame-white altar. 
 
 My gaze hath often set in sweet dismaying 
 Upon her lithe, blest fingers at their playing; 
 
 Or in a pained delight 
 Watched the white sweep of pallor o'er her face 
 As, too intensely touched by spirit grace, 
 
 She curtained her insight. 
 
 Thou knowest. Sacred Maiden, but for this 
 Her faintness, far too deep of intense bliss 
 Our clod-housed souls would drink; 
 
 76 
 
So fall her fair hands dumb, when to thy throne 
 She bears and holds us upward one by one 
 A moment e'er we sink. 
 
 Scarce had our vision delicately seen, 
 Substantiate, Helicon and Hippocrene, 
 
 Nor felt the wafted breath 
 Of presences whose glory in a gleam 
 Shoot earthward, mortalized within our dream 
 
 As we in death. 
 
 When the loosed magic of her harmonies 
 Scatters sound-petals, well had one of these, 
 
 Pressed close to thy mute breast. 
 Won thy divinity, drawn thy yearning feet 
 Down to the earth's ways, perilously sweet 
 
 To thy divine unrest. 
 
 Oh, templed in her, what if it were Thou? 
 Those tresses honey-hued around her brow 
 
 That givest them their toss? 
 Whose prisoned visage, seen a moment there 
 In hers incarnate, sent a sudden flare 
 
 Our burning sight across? 
 
 What if her eyelids, drooping with deep awe, 
 Down-weighted were by what thy whisper bore 
 
 Of couchant miracle? 
 If leans thy being inwardly to hers 
 Soft as a marsh reed to the wind that stirs 
 
 The air to oracle? 
 
 77 
 
She rises with a llly-motlon swayed, 
 
 Back from the pressure which thy presence made 
 
 During thine incarnation; 
 The Irised tissues of thy garment's weave 
 In hostaged beauty lingeringly cleave 
 
 To her thy habitation. 
 
 In such wise, Visitant Immortal, deign, 
 Between thy comings, that we have again 
 
 The fulness of her nature; 
 To infuse each vein and bruised filament 
 With store of mortal sweetness, they being spent 
 
 By their divine inflature. 
 
 When won from thine immortalizing fire 
 Ere it hath reft her of all earth-desire. 
 
 Oh, strangely tralt'rous, we 
 Torture her sister soul with chrismal share 
 Of tears, then loose It carrier-winged to bear 
 
 Our burden back to thee ! 
 
 For thus through her we hear our own heart's story 
 Take birth within this rainbow- fountained glory, 
 
 Gushing its beauty mortal 
 On some far threshold where, oh Goddess 
 
 Maiden, 
 Thou to this burden wherewith we were laden 
 
 Openest thy deathless portal. 
 
 78 
 
TO CHILDREN 
 
LITTLE LIVES 
 
 Oh little lives with folded wings, 
 Oh little hearts still sleeping, 
 
 Oh little feet that seek the way. 
 Oh eyes unused to weeping; 
 
 How many wings you spur to flight, 
 How many hearts you waken ! 
 
 How many lost ones you have lead, 
 How many tears have slaken ! 
 
 CHILD SONG 
 
 The sun and the day have run away 
 
 Over the hills In the West; 
 And the little lambs He beneath the sky 
 
 In innocent rest. 
 
 From every ship the white sails slip. 
 
 The cowslip petals close; 
 And a shy little bird gives a good-night word 
 
 Ere the daylight goes. 
 
 Sweet and long was the summer song 
 
 Sung to a summer tune; 
 And a little child prays that to-morrow's rays 
 
 Will brighten the hill-top soon. 
 
 8i 
 
WAYSIDE SONG 
 
 Grey little church In the valley, 
 Green little sheep-flecked hill; 
 
 Little rose-cloud in the heaven, 
 And evening calm and still. 
 
 Prayer in the quiet valley. 
 Peace on the placid heath; 
 
 Joy in the rosy heaven, 
 
 Dreams in the hearts beneath. 
 
 PLAYMATES 
 
 Butterflies and babies, 
 Wings and little feet. 
 
 Playing all the morning 
 In the meadow sweet. 
 
 All the summer morning 
 Let them dance and play, 
 
 But when evening cometh 
 Cuddle them away. 
 
 82 
 
BLOSSOMS 
 
 A little tree 
 So blithe to see 
 With blossoms all alit; 
 Dear little heart 
 How like thou art 
 To it! 
 
 Its shadow small 
 Falls scarce at all 
 Upon the patient grass; 
 And thine is quite 
 As soft and light, 
 My lass. 
 
 In pink and white 
 It is bedight 
 Full fair and sweet to see; 
 In daintiness 
 And graciousness 
 Like thee. 
 
 It is so young 
 No birds have sung 
 Within its boughs. They fear 
 It is a stray 
 And naughty fay 
 Dropped here ! 
 
 83 
 
SECRET VOYAGE 
 
 Through pearly waters and violet, 
 
 Toward the close of day, 
 A little bark with winged sails 
 
 Wafted its gentle way. 
 
 Under the ancient amber cliffs 
 
 Its lightsome way it bore, 
 Soft as a little dream escaped 
 
 From the bondaged time of yore. 
 
 Oh, where are you going, little bark. 
 That may not stay your flight? 
 
 What distant shore do you hope to gain 
 Before the close of night? 
 
 No answer sent the little bark, 
 
 But silently sailed on. 
 Until it was a tiny speck 
 
 Upon the setting sun. 
 
 84 
 
A DUET 
 
 Sailing along at the end of day, 
 When the sun had sunk to rest, 
 
 And the naughty httle clouds of gold 
 Ran out of their home in the west, 
 
 I heard the song of the merry frogs 
 
 Upon the river shore, 
 And high above in the quiet cliff 
 
 A little owl I saw. 
 
 The frolicsome frogs sang loud and clear 
 
 Of many pleasant things. 
 But the mournful little owl sat dumb, 
 
 A dreaming of dead kings. 
 
 CHURCH BELLS 
 
 In summer-time and winter 
 
 The little church bell rings. 
 Morning, noon and evening, 
 
 For people and for kings, 
 To sing their hymns and say their prayers 
 
 And other holy things. 
 
 In every land a church bell rings 
 
 And people gather there 
 Just as we do, with bended heads 
 
 And hands clasped tight In prayer. 
 And all are glad because they know 
 
 That God is everywhere. 
 8s 
 
SHIPS 
 
 Two white sails peep over the hill, i 
 
 How strange it seems to me! 
 For who would dream that the meadow-land 
 
 Led to the wide grey sea ? 
 
 The wide grey sea beyond the walls 
 
 Where ships go out at night 
 
 So far, so far, they can't return \ 
 
 When comes the morning light. ^ 
 
 But on must sail, and on and on, j 
 
 All day and night and day, 'i 
 
 Until they spy another land, \ 
 
 Though it be far away. ] 
 
 Poor ships that cannot stay at home, j 
 
 I hope that you will find 1 
 
 As sweet a shore and bright a sun j 
 
 As you have left behind. ] 
 
 86 
 
LIGHT AND SHADOW 
 
 Sunshine and morning hours 
 Bring to beds of waving flowers. 
 Bees and butterflies so bright 
 That love the honey and the light. 
 
 Day done, and evening hours 
 Bring repose to weary flowers. 
 In the still and darkening air 
 Not a bee may linger there. 
 
 THE EARTH AND LITTLE CHILDREN 
 
 Hither, children! Hush and hear! 
 Now's the flowery time of year. 
 When with opening flower and leaf 
 Everything feels glad relief. 
 
 Let your little hearts sing madly, 
 And your voices ring out gladly; 
 Dance and call, fairies all. 
 In a pretty madrigal. 
 
 See how fair the earth is drest, 
 In the springtime loveliest; 
 Like a little child whose gladness 
 Charms away our winter sadness. 
 
 Happy earth, all full of singing, 
 Joy to little children bringing. 
 
 87 
 
A CHANGE OF MIND 
 
 Upon the road 
 I met a toad 
 
 Near by the garden bright; 
 'Twas spotted brown 
 From feet to crown, 
 
 A most amazing sight! 
 
 It looked so queer 
 And hopped so near 
 
 I quickly turned away 
 And meekly said : 
 "My poppy bed 
 
 I'll see another day." 
 
 88 
 
SUMMER MORNING 
 
 Bees in the larkspur 
 
 Busily burrowing 
 Setting the flower-bells ringing; 
 
 Birds in the bushes 
 
 Flitting and fluttering, 
 Filling the copses with singing. 
 
 Blue eyes opening 
 
 Wide from their slumbering 
 Ever so far away; 
 
 Little hearts, little hands 
 
 In other lands, 
 I wish you were here to play ! 
 
 89^ 
 
IN MAY 
 To Eleanor 
 
 It was a pleasant afternoon 
 
 When we went forth from town 
 
 To take the air and view the scene 
 And wander up and down. 
 
 We visited a pretty house 
 And found it was too small ; 
 
 We peered about and praised it well 
 And made a pleasant call. 
 
 Then up the road until we reached 
 The Club-House cool and free; 
 
 We sat upon the lawfn and there 
 Had toast and jam and tea. 
 
 A pretty view of sloping green, 
 
 A grove of shady trees; 
 And far away, the distant hills 
 
 Across the misty leas. 
 
 At cool of eve, refreshed and sweet, 
 We came contented home; 
 
 As doves, all day upon the wing, 
 Do softly, surely come. 
 
 90 
 
WATTIE'S GARDEN 
 
 I put the small seeds in the ground 
 
 With proper space between; 
 I cleared and smoothed the earth around, 
 
 And kept it nice and clean. 
 
 A tiny blade of green pushed through 
 
 The dark and heavy earth ; 
 And soon a little pair of leaves 
 
 Unfolded into birth. 
 
 Another blade, another blade 
 
 Till all the place was full; 
 And soon so many leaves uncurled 
 
 A few I had to pull. 
 
 I watched and loved them every day 
 And watered them when dry; 
 
 I brushed the rose-bugs all away 
 And weeded carefully. 
 
 Through sun and rain and fog and wlind 
 They grew and grew and grew. 
 
 Until a lovely garden fair 
 Lay open to the view. 
 
 Oh hollyhocks and fox gloves, 
 
 Arise up tall and sweet; 
 While garden pinks and coxcombs bright 
 
 Are blooming at my feet. 
 
 91 
 
Big canterbury bells of blue 
 
 Are ringing silently; 
 And columbines are shining bright 
 
 As moonlight on the sea. 
 
 White plumes of spiarea wave 
 
 Just handy to my reach 
 So I may pluck them for my friends 
 
 And give a plume to each. 
 
 The lovely roses planted near 
 
 Are not my really own, 
 They are my Mummy dear's but still 
 
 I love them every one. 
 
 And here amid the garden flowers 
 
 In fairy land I roam 
 While all the time I'm just as near 
 
 As I can be to home. 
 
 92 
 
PEGGY SWEET 
 
 Prim little Peg came out to me 
 Curled and smocked and sweet to see. 
 I wanted to hold her on my knee 
 And keep her forever there; but she, 
 Light as a cloud o'er a summer sea, 
 Floated away from me airily. 
 For all things mortal elusive be 
 Because of their immortality. 
 
 93 
 
BROTHERHOOD 
 
 A path across the meadow 
 
 Diagonal and far, 
 Leads me to the waving place 
 
 Where the rushes are. 
 
 Rushes oh ! and Iris 
 
 Where the finches sing; 
 
 Beauty on the lowly earth, 
 Sweetness on the wing. 
 
 Let us, like the wild birds 
 Pluck and eat a berry; 
 
 All the world is full of glee. 
 We too will be merry. 
 
 Run and laugh and play. 
 On the wave of wonder; 
 
 If your heart is light 
 You will not slip under. 
 
 94 
 
CLOVER'S HUMMING SONG 
 
 I must flower and overbrim 
 
 So my lover the bee 
 Will come from afar 
 
 To suck honey from me. 
 
 Bee law will bring him 
 
 Wide the world over; 
 He Is my own bee, 
 
 I am his clover. 
 
 Flower and fill the cup 
 
 With sun and honey, 
 Shadows and pearls of rain 
 
 Must be made sunny. 
 
 Clover of rose and sweet, 
 
 Walt I the morning 
 When my far lover-bee 
 
 Comes with gold crowning. 
 
 95 
 
GARDEN SONG 
 
 Rain in the garden 
 
 Falling fresh and sweet, 
 Cooling the flowers 
 
 After noon-day heat. 
 
 Robins after rainfall 
 
 In the wet sun; 
 Primroses folding, 
 
 And the day is done. 
 
 96