"hfraS .fan ty ./)W fry Souvenir Ebition of ■ ^ r^ /> tl ed Bluff, California 1 S"> ( Souvenir Edition of Poems By M. H. Cantrell Christmas, 1916 (Copyright 1900, 1906, 1916, by M. H. Cantrell. All rights reserved.) Dear Friend: Please accept this Souvenir Edition of a few of my poems and the portraits of myself and family as a token of our friendship for you. I had it printed for a Christmas souvenir for our friends of whom you are one. Several of these poems are only excerpts of copyright editions of 1900 and 1906, and some are new ones. Hence they are in frag- ment form — scarcely any of which are printed in full on account of space. For instance, Imagination and The Sinking of Atlantis are mere extract stanzas of a long poem containing about five hundred stanzas of which these are only samples. Also Christmas Night is a short ex:ract of Midnight Reveries which is complete in more than a hundred similar Spenserian stanzas as printed in full in the 1906 edition. The same is true as to some of the others. All the single verses were taken from longer poems. A few, however, are com- plete short poems as you will readily perceive. If you should find only one sentiment in all of them that awakens a responsive thought or feeling for the betterment of mankind, the author will feel repaid for the time he has taken in editing and presenting them to you as a 1916 Christmas greeting. Most respectfully, THE AUTHOR. i *l ! CJ.A453831 'JH 291917 THE DAWN OF A NEW EPOCH. J stand in the twilight glimmer Of an epoch passing out, — In the dawn of marvelous innovations Of an epoch wrapped in doubt. MIDNIGHT REVERIES, Christmas Night v Tis now the pensive hour of musing deep On night's enhallowed hush sweet silence stands, And raptured thought, upborne on revery's sweep, Strays 'yond its bounds the gulf of vision spans, And from imagination's dreamful tower scan? The realms of fancy which unfold to sight A better future, better hopes and plans, For who could muse on scenes of such a n:'ght Nor feel within the better thoughts awake to light 9 Ail harshen sounds are hushed and silence broods Like blessings borne on incense-laden breeze; Within the peaceful calm no changeful moods My reveries swerve or swage but to appease; So trends the hallowed theme with heavenly plei For mild deep musing doth all malic.9 chain; Through long sweet dreamful hours of thoughts like 1 No withering cares flow back upon the brain, Or saddened memories that awake the soul to pa!r From out the midnight silence seems to come From many voices out of One that say, "Look up to heaven, be not blind or dumb, Behold how all the orbs one God obey, The form thou wearest now He made from ^lay, Gave it thy soul — why not to Him return, For he may hope who feels desire to pray? O thou, this all-important lesson learn — For each benighted soul the heavenly watchfires burn. CANTRELL'S POEMS. O Christmas night, Religion's holiest hour! What heavenly hope is hallowed in thy hushf When we forget ourselves in awe of the power Of God; the stars, the mellow moonbeams' blush, The softened sounds of waterfalls, the rush Of murmuring streams meandering on their way, The wind's low sigh, the gurgling fountains' gush, When the mild moon resumes her silent sway And from her zenith height shines downward bright as day Full on the dreamful hush she shone but now As on the Manger Babe in splendor wild She shone and lit the halo on His holy brow; Propitious peace proclaimed the Sacred Child As on a world of woe He gazed and smiled: 'Twas ages long ago but still the midnight theme, The moon, the Babe, the Virgin Mother undefiled, Awale repentant souls from out the dream Of selfish thoughts to those that breathe of One Supreme. Religion seems to hallow memory then When all that's good and true and loved return. And at the holy shrine not made by men Some. prayer we offer and in meekness learn ~~ humble b~w ; n spite of all wa spurn: Then love for God revives — the doubter fears, The Spirit speaks but only souls discern, From out the past a phantom host appears — The sins of life brought back by the refluent years. THE MIDNIGHT MASS, Or Watch Meeting Darkness has veiled the mellow light, The moon her silvery shroud unfurled, And somber silence broods tonight Upon the cold and cheerless world. Athwart the waves of yonder stream Like sparks of spray the moonbeams quiver, And all is tranquil as a dream Save the flow of the rushing river. CANTRELL'S POEMS. Hushed are the echoes on the breeze, All sounds subdued as if by awe impressed. The zephyrs sigh thro the boughs of the trees But waken not the soul's sweet rest. The sentinel stars so mildly bright Thro all the night their watch are keeping. Calmed are the sighs of the sorrowing tonight For in soft sleep they know no weeping. "Hark! it is midnight's tranquil noon, The church bells chime the midnight mass. And like yon pale and placid moon The new years seem to come and pass. A merry chime their peals enrolling The New-Year's birth with joyous chees ; A solemn dirge their chimes are tolling, 'Tis the knell of the dying year. The fleeting years, how swift they pass! With us who watched the closing year 'When last we held the midnight mass Alas! alas! are all not here, Yon mournful marble points the way That all on earth must sometime go Then who is here tonight so gay That may escape that cup of woe? For each a mournful hour will come And change the brightest joys to tears; The gayest shall at last succumb However long that death defers. iVIay each rejoice with every breath While yet he may in youthful bloom, "But first prepare your soul for death To meet the angel at the tomb. DUTY: Then it behooves each one tonight At once to hear, believe, repent 'Confess, forgive, be baptized right, And love the brethren, be content. CANTRELL'S POEMS. THE APPARITION Is it day? I was so restless las: night And the pale mcon gave such glimmering light Through the broken clouds That her quivering rays through the window pane Pell checkered on my pillow where had lain One who sleeps in shrouds; — Low and silent laid By the streamlet's marge — hushed in death's cold sleep — Where the spirit vigils their lonely night-watch keep Neath the willow's shade The wind was wild and high when I wolre Through the crossing boughs the moonbeams broke In livid gleaming And again her angel form did appenr All wreathed in love, and I thought to call her But I was dreaming — I looked but alas! I could not see — her spirit form had fled 'Twas only an apparition of the dead On the midnight pass The tenderest call cannot waken her now, Birds sing above her on the willow's bough,. But she hears not Their lovely lay. nor longer sighing caress Fondle me with loving tenderness; No, all, all's forgot — Never, never more Will she enfold me — ~he sleeps in peace By the streamlet's marge, but sorrow will cease On the spirit shore. Yes, I remember it all, 'twas in the spring When flowers blow and birds are wont to sing, And the stilly air Fraught with the fragrance of odorous blooms Spreads through all the woody aisles rich perfumes — And still lingering there Till dead Autumn leaves Inhale with arid breath their sweets away. Like lulling dreams upon our slumbers prey— All our love deceives. CANTRELL'S POEMS. BIRDS OF THOUGHT "Wild and high the sea birds cry, And all are plumed for ilight — To perch unknown they all are flown, And I am sad to-night. The night is black, they'll all come back To-morrow's early dawn, Then slumber deep from my lids will creep Arc! my fears will all "be gone. JMy heart beats quick with pulses thick My thoughts are plumed for flight, For sisters mree long lost to me I yearn to see to-night. The night is dark and listen, harkl 'Tis but my nervous breath Sighing low with a shuddering flow Like the whisper of death. A thought so strange, — beyond the range Of reason's stern control — Like fevered dreams of vision seems To bewilder my soul. But thoughts of Doubt, like birds that're out In a shelterless night, Will feel the lack in the midnight black Of a Guide that is right. The years creep on our joys are gone Before we are aware, And care and pain "besiege the brain With the thoughts of despair. The years are fled, their pleasures dead- Time thrust, them down the slope, And age is here with nothing to cheer Except delusive hope. God will sum in a world to come The moments of each year And task us anew with something to do For those we squandered here. CANTRELL'S POEMS, DRIFTING DOWN THE STREAM- The Saciamento River Musing in the moonlight Drifting down the stream, Floating soft at midnight Gently as I dream. Down the Sacramento — lonely In a frail canoe, You and I, and — only Room enough for two. Starry skies above me, Mellow moon so bright, Smile as though they love me, Shining all the night. Starry Skies below me, Moon inverted too, Shining up to show me — "Upward from the blue." Sloping hills receding, Woodlands whirling past, How the shores are speeding- Gliding smooth and fast. How the river rushes Onward to the sea, Gurgles, groans, and gushes, blowing swift and free. Musing in the moonlight, Making music sweet, Floating soft at midnight As the tides retieat. Sweetest strains are straying- ^lowing from my flute; AU the while I'm playing Echoes follow suit; Mellow noteo are dying — Echoes far away, Softly seem their sighing — Sighing as I play; Murmurs down the river Making mellow moan, Sweeter than the giver — Echoes' softer tone, Making music double, Notes and echoes low — Drowning all my trouble In their ebb and flow. f A THANKSGIVING DOXOLOGY Blessed be our Heavenly Father, Blessed be His Son, Blessed be the Holy Spirit, Blessed all in One. Blessed be the holy angels, Heavenly messengers they That "eiicampeth round about them That fear Him" and obey. CANTRELL'S POEMS. "'Are they not all ministering spirits For the sake of them Who shall be heirs of salvation" In a spiritual realm? Blessed be our God forever, And His praise prolong, To Him who has blessed me ever I consecrate this song. A HYMN TO MY COUNTRY'S FLAG Forward forever, O Flag of the free, Freedom shall triumph wherever thou be; Hope of the slave if he only behold — Free if he touch but the hem of thy fold; Hope is awaken and waiting for thee, Waiting for freedom, O Flag of the free, Monarchs were masters through-out the wide wond Ere thou wert born and by freemen unfurled; Flag of an empire not ruled by one head But by the people who govern instead; Hope is awaken and waiting for thee, Waiting for freedom, O Flag of the free. Peace is thy motto with malice for none, War to the death if by tyrants begun; God and forgiveness thy terms to the foe Whan he has fallen, in his hour of woe. Hope is awaken and waiting for thee, Waiting for freedom, O Flag of the free. Welcomed wherever thy stripes and thy stars Brings the free ballot and bigotry bars — Stars of heraldic redemption of right, Stripes for correcting the doctrine of might: Hope is awaken and waiting for thee, Waiting for freedom, Flag of the free. Thou hast annulled the prerogative of kings, Gave our Republic her starspangled wings, Built on the base of the home and the school, First to proclaim it, "the people shall rule.": Hope is awaken and waiting for thee, Waiting for freedom, O Flag of the free. CANTRELL'S POEMS Not to invade and to vanquish like Rome, But to uplift and enlighten the home; Teach the world to change the sword for the pei>„ Make of mankind one brotherhood of men: Hope is awaken and waiting for thee, Wait:ng for freedom, O Flag of the free. Never a subject subdues to thy reign, Never an exile casts from thy domain, Where thou art planted forever shall dwell Freedom of speech and of worship as well: Where thou art planted forever shall dwell Cod and hope: Flag of my country, farewell. DO NOT NEGLECT THE LITTLE ONES Do not neglect the little ones; A baby's budding soul is waxen mold And shaped for life by every word it's told, Then O beware of jokes and puns And careless words in lightness said Lest they a meaning false convey, — The minds of these, like little trees, Once bent will stay. Do not neglect the little ones, Nor think their little wicked ways are cute Because they're small, such bears but evil fruit, Who does, to God his duty shuns; But train while young what God commands And vigilance is the price — Those little hands are tendril bands That cling to vice. Dj not neglect tha little ones, For such inherit Heaven's kingdom blest; Whate'er beside no: one of these molest, Lest God himself in wrath disowns And punish in a world to come Those who neglect them here: Even the dull who may seem dumb Are not for sneer. CANTRELL'S POEMS. TO MY LITTLE NIECE, DEWENE FLYNT What art thou laughing about, O Dewene? Laughing aloud at thyself to be seen! Whils: thou art prattling and prattling so gay, Thinking that it will always be May, And thy employment will always be play, Thou inexperienced sweet Fay. Aged but a year and a day. What art thou crying about, O Dewene? Crying ss laughing only to be seen: Grief for the toy that has rolled from thy sight Which is thy world ind thy hope and delight — Pleased with a bauble or anything bright, Thou inexperienced sweet Fay Thinking of nothing but play. What art thou thinking about, O Dewene? Thinking of Wonderland fairies, I ween; Threading life's shuttle with gossamer gleams, Wrought in a warp which impalpable seems, Weaving an infantine fabric of dreams Thou inexperienced sweet Fay, Thinking of nothing but play. I too am thinking today, O Dewene — Thinking of thee in the far unforeseen; Life in its blossom so blithesome but now, Soon with its sorrows to sadden thy brow, Beauty to blast and the body to bow, Thou inexperienced sweet Fay Thinking of only today. Thus I am thinking today, O Dewene, Thinking of thee in the far unforeseen; What false pretenses! friendships untrue! What sad experiences! pleasures how few! What thorns of sorrow to pierce thy heart through! Ere thou hast crossed the dark way, Tnou inexperienced sweet Fay, 10 CANTRELL'S POEMS. I have consulted God's Word, O Dewene, Thy horoscope from the Scriptures to glean; This is thy future, by His Biok I divine, — For all who follow its teachings to the line, Chastity, wisdom, and truth will be thine, Thou inexperienced sweet Fay, Think of thy future's bright day. Consult the Scriptures daily, O Dewene, Study them well to know what they mean, For only they can cast thy horoscope, Fullest in fortitude and strongest in hope, Firmest and fittest with evils to cope, Thou inexperienced sweet Fay, Think of thy future's bright day. TO LITTLE GRADY Be good my boy, be ever good, Let others do, if any would, The wrong for spite in passion's rage; Be good, be kind, be thoughtful — sage Be patient with the dull and slow And in their hearts thy love will grow; In r:'per years 'twill bud and bloom And bear thee fruit beyond the tomD. Be modest, manly and polite, Be ready to speak out for right, Be on the side of God and Truth And make thyself a model youth, And in thy years of manhood's bloom No scowl thy features will assume — Be ever pure and calm and kind, The face reveals the thoughts of mind Be honest, faithful and sincere, Be always bright and full of cheer, The gloomy soul can never be A fit abode for spirits free. Thy country needs such men to make Her future laws when faith shall break When evil men with greed for gold Her honored name have bought and sold CANTRELL'S POEMS. 11 Be studious in thy childhood's spring That when life's winter comes 'twill bring Thee wisdom in abundant store Of days well spent in useful lore, Then age with all its years will be A triumph, not a curse, to thee, And when the grave demands thy frame 'Twill bear above an honored name PHASES OF LIFE Life is but a mold 'To cast a soul that lives beyond decay, And when the soul her earthly aims unfold Flings the mold away. The long sought treasure "We may ever strive to reach in vain, If gained is hut an empty pleasure Lengthened out of pain. For the soul that craves it Will find it useless in the grave, And often all the good, in life, he saves it And becomes its slave. So beware of riches Except ye use it well for noble things, Love God, adorn H's doctrines, fill your nichsj B3 ye more than kings. Cold perseverance, Selfrelying, scales the tower of fame, .And with the hand of patient endurance Writes in gold his name. 'Our Ipve is like a trailing vine, Within itself it can not rise, Must round some kindred object twine. Or else it withers, droops and dies ISBless the widow and the orphan spake the Christ to man of old, Feed the poor and Clothe the naked!, cease thy love and lust for gold. 12 CANTRELL'S POEMS'. THE SIBER'S SOLILOQUY 'Tis hoary winter now, and melancholy Sadness pervades the hushed air! Dim through The gathering gloom the moonbeams pale are sleep]!.,/ Enthroned in placid awe, and rigor swept By winds, the fleecy, snow-capped mountains raise Their lofty brows in regal grandeur now; And, frowning from their towering heights, their tali White-ribbed peaks cast an icy chilliness Upon the cold and desolate landscape. Banked along The edying horizon — lulled and low — Lie shattered storm-torn clouds in sullen repose, The vapor-curded moon, behind the mountain's blow Is setting dreamily. Now robed in white, The cold and solemn summits, bleak and bald, Cast their long chilly shadows cold athwart The twilight plain. And rising, spectral-like, Wild winds beat at the screaky casements, moan And rattle through the lonely prison bars, Pass with the fitful gust and die again Upon the placid stillness. Lo! the glassy stre^mlev. Set with the crystal studs of winter, winds It's struggling course slow through the icled reeds Reflects the tinsiled beauties of the cold And flaky Heavens. Silence settles deep. And on the lake and landscape lone, now broods A breathless hushedness that wakes the mind To sad reflections and the heart to sympathy. Housed in the homes of plentitude and pride, No love or word goes out to poor unthought-of Uncared-for victims of the heartless Czar. And as the warm life currents flood the frame From fountains fresh with food's supply and spread The lineaments with crimson glow of health, No thought of destitution pleads at conscience For our assistance. CANTRELL'S POEMS. 13 As the keen cutting wind Comes hurrying up from the bleak, cold North And howls and moans again through crevices And casements of the grim old prison walls, And dies again in stillness and then comes Again upon the rowdying bluster like Some weird night fiend to chase away the dreams Of Quietness, I fancy to myself All of the forms of wretchedness and woe Careering at large o'er the fruitless fields And wastes of cold Siberia's shelterless plains. All the untold, unspeakable sorrows of The exile whose scant stores, exhausted by The ceaseless scourge of famine and disease, Now feels with blunted pride and deadening dread The soul-disturbing pangs of mind's unrest. And as I look out from the prison window Upon the frozen grandeur there, I draw One long sad view of wretchedness and woe; And grimly pictured on the niveous scroll Wide desolation sleeps in calm repose. Hollow-eyed misery creeps from cells of want, And Famine skeleton-robed stalks about The haunts of poverty and looks upon The foodless scene with wasted, hollow cheeks, And gestures at the scant supplies of nature Locked in the frozen folds of winter. The midnight lamp, my only companion Now flickers faintly in the frosty silence Like some wiered specter-courier from out The memory's past, and speaks in tongueless whisper? Of mother, home and little ones at rest And tender tears kept back drown half the sadness Of these melancholy reveries. And as it casts its gleam in gentle glimmers Out through the casement on the tinsiled snow-drifts, Reflection brings to view again the wild Bewildering slope of departed years Revealed on one wild range, and as I gaze Upon the sterile wastes of Siber's hills I long bu + long in vain to see once more The family fireside and familiar scenes 14 CANTRELL'S POEMS. That long since faded into empty nothingness And say to that dim lamp expire in gloom And leave me all alone as if thou ne'er Hadst been — It blares — 'tis darkness now. From the*? Dim lamp, I learn a lesson. Youth, like thee, Blazes with hope's eager expectations — Blares at the many turning-points of life — Expires in feeble age. IMAGINATION The bold imagination with its all beholding gaze Explores the mysteries farther than scientific eye surveys; Upborne on thoughts ethereal, more of pleasing fancy fond r It sweeps the dome of distance, dives into the depths beyond. It feeds on lovely visions — sails the fancy-seas unknown, Draws out the classic features from the shapeless blocks of stonev It mounts the starry stairway leading upward, ever higher, With never sated vision and with thoughts that never tire. It dredges out the oceans, sweeps beyond the starry dome. And ranges out forever and is everywhere at home; Restores the forms of fossils and repeoples all the past, And from the living present molds the mystic future's cast. The patriarchal father with his venerable head of gray Alone beside the dying embers makes a sad survey; He sees the vacant places with his aged vision slack — They're gone forever but imagination brings them back. Their places filled by fancy and the absent cease to roam — Again around the family fireside sees the loved at home; The little cherub prattler still in fancy-vision lives, He feels its warm carresses which imagination gives, He hears its tender prattle as he muses by the fire — Its voice is hushed forever though it never can expire For memory mirrors ever and imagination burns — The grave is lost in re very as the faded form returns. % CANTRELL'S POEMS. 15 Thus soars imagination through the boundless realms of space, A vagrant child of fancy and without a resting place, An iridescent vision like the rainbow's mystic law That onward moves before us as we nearer to it draw. We see it .here in fancy but a fading frost of blue, A bow of crimson beauty moving onward with :he view— The mind's mirage of memory with its vague inverted schemes, Arising on our visions and dissolving with our dreams. It lures the youthful dreamer onward to the "heap of gold," It lures the superstitious and it lures the brave and bold, It lures the aged dotard onward to the end of life. And bends a bow of beauty o'er a world of woe and strife. We see the visions vanish a s we venture on and on, We reach the end bewildered and the "heap of gold" is gone; We reach the end bewildered and we fathom for the trutb We start again to journey where we started in our youth. THE SINKING OF ATLANTIS I saw Atlantis swallowed up with all her freight of souls— The wall of waves that wailed her dirge and now above her rolls; I felt the wild upheaval, and I heard the awful roar When earthquakes rent the ocean and the rifted waves closed o'er. Upon the bed of ocean lie her spires and steeples strown Beneath the weight of waters and their ceaseless seething moan: The wrecks of mighty temples buried in their briny graves — The grim abode of monsters and the sport of angry waves. There lie her gorgeous cities silent in eternal sleep Where rise no more the war-cry and no howling tempests sweep; There silence reigns sternal save the seething of the surge. That in a monotone of sadness wails a ceaseless dirge. There stands the gaudy palace settling slowly in the mud, Around it seethe the surges, rolls above the ceaseless flood; Its domes and towers toppled but erect the court and halls With many a rent an % d chasm in its wave-beleaguered walls. 16 CANTRELL'S POEMS. There strange abyssal fauna spectre-like in silence sport, There gorgeous ocean goblins haunt the alcoves of the court There phosforescent monsters o'er the oozy bottom creep And with their lurid lanterns light the darkness of the deep. And there she lies forever, buried from the sight of man, No resurrection for her save the evolution plan — When raised by some upheaval when the ages shall reclaim Her from the depths of ocean through volcanic force and flame. When many million ages roll before the human eye, Earth's cooling center shrinking leaves the beds of ocean dry, Or by some seismic rupture when the isles their shapes revise From out the world of water man may see Atlantis rise. Far in the future's future when her clime has changed its zone, Her valleysveiled with verdure and her hills new groves have grown, And crowded populations dot again her fruitful plains Some future archaeologist may unearth her lost remains. "I can" are the thunder-words that drive The submarine and navigate the air; "I can't" is the epitaph of failure Upon the tombstone of despair. From the present looking backward Lies the past a field of blood, And the cries of crime are wafted O'er the centuries' crimson flood. Long I to uplift the fallen Ere I sleep within the tomb, See the heathen lands converted, See the Christian bud in bloom. I may not behold the blossom But 'twill bloom and bear its fruit, For the Christ shall reap the harvest Where the Gospel seed takes root. » GRADY T. CANTRELL fflg) PSALM 150. An exhortation to praise God with all kind of instrpmtnU 1 Praise ye the Lord. * * * * 3 Praise him with the sound of the trumpet. Praise him nth the psaltery and harp. 4 Praise him ''with the timbrel and pipe. Praise him with stringed instruments and organs. 5 Praise him upon the loud f cymbal s . Praise him upon the high sounding cymbals. 6 Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord. Praise ye the Lord. MRS. M. H. CANTRELL and her Musical Instruments 018 602 5: Hollingei P H t ,S R * RY 0F CONGRESS ipn 018 602 537 4 » Hollinger Corp.