3aop Helton 
 
 ^''^M^,:.^^M 
 
 
Class ^£^sEJS 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSnV 
 
YOUTH'S PILGRIMAGE 
 
YOUTH'S 
 PILGRIMAGE 
 
 ROY HELTON 
 
 THE POET LORE COMPANY 
 
 PUBLISHERS^ BOSTON 
 
Copyright, 1915, by Roy Helton 
 
 All Rights Reserved 
 
 ^^3^' 
 
 It 
 
 Thb Gorham Prkss, Boston, U. S. A. 
 
 JlIN 18 1915 
 ©CIA403 426 
 
YOUTH'S PILGRIMAGE 
 
YOUTH'S PILGRIMAGE 
 
 The mist of morning like a dream spun prayei 
 
 Skeined in the sleep of flowers, stirred to greet 
 
 The trembling hope of dawn ; the star fraught air 
 
 Grew vocal in low tenderness of meek 
 
 High anthems, plaintive utterance of birds 
 
 Pleading for pity with no want of words 
 
 To Light, their fiery lord. And lo, the cheek 
 
 Empyrean, at their psalm did throb and thrill ; 
 The sun crept up; wisp clouds like fire, rolled 
 Faint crimson scud of heaven to crown the hills: 
 And herald hierarchs winging, flush with gold. 
 Flamed day into her glory. In her bower 
 Fronting the sunrise in the sheerest tower 
 That topped the spires and every glittering hold 
 
 Of Childhood's habitation, Rosabel 
 
 Rose timidly and thrust the rustling shade 
 
 Of silken curtains wide: a nimbus fell 
 
 Sheen on her sunny hair that stirred and strayed 
 
 Down her white shoulders to her pulsing side, 
 
 Warmi in the gush of summer. Loath to hide 
 
 These beauties from the day their tendrils played 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 Flashing among the nimble moats. Agaze 
 Over wide crimsoning meadows to the sea 
 Her eyes were tranced with beauty, and the maze 
 Of shadowy lanes teased her brown feet; each tree 
 Called with inviting arms, and choral song 
 Made lovely every leaf. She paused not long, 
 But to each window stealing wistfully 
 
 Gazed out one moment: lo, a forest dim 
 Huddled in numberless gloomy hills did run 
 Endlessly to the south and vapors grim 
 Swung heavily on the treetops, where the sun 
 Pierced not at hottest noonday. Toward the West 
 And North, above a long white wall, there rest 
 Warm quivering mists of everlasting dawn. 
 
 "Oh grim consuming world, thy mysteries 
 Of linked and various metaled days, enchain 
 My soul," she cried, "Thy heavy mists that rise 
 From bleeding embers of youth sunk and slain, 
 Lure me from this too calm, too lucid air. 
 To seek, with him, thy gloom, thy chill despair, 
 To whirl in stormy passion and to dare 
 Thy frantic joy that is the kin of pain! 
 
 8 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 "I fear thee, yet I draw apace upon thee: 
 Shudder and yet grow nigh thee day by day; 
 And love that binds my heart and fate that won me 
 Claim sacrifice and barter no delay. 
 Oh Childhood, thou art dying, thou art sped. 
 In him I love thou liest white and dead — 
 A little corpse with roses wound and wed, 
 Laid by moist April in the lap of May!" 
 
 Then through the toss of clouds one moment gleam- 
 ed 
 Far glimpses of quick light like the flash of wings, 
 And round her tower swept solemn song that seemed 
 Missioned with memory of soul wanderings 
 In the fair elder regions beyond birth. 
 Oh song! How very seldom in the dearth 
 Of human hearts, thy sacred summonings 
 
 Stir the old breathless dreams that liberate 
 The soil mewed spirit to one moment's winging! 
 How silent is thy consort as we wait 
 Nightly below the stars; how in the singing 
 Of Merle and Skylark do we vainly hope 
 For note of thy revealing voice, or grope 
 Where dim cathedral's lonely spark is swinging, 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 Or stoop in candled holiness to prayer 
 
 Yet find thee silent still: thy voice doth cease 
 
 To lord earth's solitudes and to the air 
 
 Of hilltops hath grown strange; thy tones increase 
 
 Like organ notes, these days, mid murk and moil 
 
 Where one soul thrills with glory of its toil, 
 
 Or hungered child hath joy, who needs not least. 
 
 Yet in her heart thy calling voice did rise, 
 Shrill as the morning pean of the lark. 
 And mist and sorrow dazzled from her eyes 
 Like night's cloak touched by dawn's enkindling 
 
 spark. 
 "Come woe!" she cried, "Or pain, if pain must be. 
 And blinding passions cast thy pall on me; 
 Burn me or chain with chains, I still am free 
 While there is love to lamp me through the dark!" 
 
 Then down from her tower she swept with a heart 
 
 that was song, 
 And the ferns and the flowers were mad for the 
 
 flash of her feet 
 They fondled the grass like the sunbeams aflush at 
 
 the dawn 
 In dalliance with the clover's dewy sweet; 
 
 lO 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 But her lover had waited and watched till his eyes 
 
 were dim; 
 As she came a shroud of sorrow swept over him : 
 With a smile that was sadder than tears did he turn, 
 
 did he greet 
 
 Her kiss, her joy, her pity, yea her fear; 
 And cried, "Ah might I see thee ever young 
 And everlasting fair as now, and hear 
 Thy greeting like a waterfall whose tongue 
 Utters continual music to all hours ! 
 But I have lost the favor of life's flowers 
 No songs of Joy may from my lips be flung." 
 
 "What, do you hold my kisses in disdain?" 
 Cried Rosabel, "And stand aloof from me?" 
 "My kiss upon your brow would print a stain," 
 He answered, "That might not assoilzied be. 
 My love's fair tree is girt by dreams that cling 
 Like foul vines round the leafy slumbering 
 Of reaching oaks, and make a loathsome thing 
 Of mine own flesh, when I walk forth with thee." 
 
 II 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 "Dreams?" "I have had them too." "But such as 
 
 mine 
 Poison the very stock they feed upon. 
 Thy love," he cried, "I held a thing divine — 
 Closer than seeping showers or the sun, 
 To that unseen but throbbing vital heart 
 That all ensanguined beauties doth impart 
 To things yet fresh in being or scarce begun. 
 
 Last night I dreamed of you, dreamed that you came. 
 And called me softly through the summer night; 
 Came like a brown wren singing on my name 
 Until the warm air trembled with delight: 
 The warm air trembled when my little maiden 
 Came like an elf with wild flowers overladen; 
 The stars had never seen so sweet a sight. 
 
 But I — what did I then ? I need be brave 
 To speak the words that must make love grow less, 
 Yet should I prove Love's renegade to have 
 On old false terms thy heart's young tenderness: 
 I cannot see thee through familiar eyes 
 For blinding passions in my soul arise 
 Like mists that in the deep September skies 
 Veil dying summer's languid loveliness. 
 
 12 
 
Youth*s Pilgrimage 
 
 Your arms that came around me in the dark 
 Begot a sudden rapture In my dream — 
 A joy — pure joy it seemed — a sudden spark 
 Falling sky deep from an ungathered gleam 
 Of passion burning and untempered fire; 
 But sudden in its stead sprang dark desire 
 Groping in night without one starry beam: 
 
 Desire, blind, not knowing what it sought. 
 But hot within the bliss of thy warm arms: 
 To hold thee flesh to flesh, till life and thought 
 Were crushed in the enfolding of thy charms: 
 To let my lips and fingers find a nest 
 Upon the swaying summer of thy breast 
 And feel thee tremble deep to strange alarms. 
 
 To let my hands sweep round thy gracile thighs 
 To print the scarlet stain of kisses there" — 
 "Enough!" cried Rosabel, whose fluttering eyes 
 Sought shelter in the garment of her hair. 
 She trembled at the tempest in her brain ; 
 Searching for words, found but a calling pain : 
 Sought virtue that was snow and found deep stain 
 Crimson upon cold lips grown sudden fair. 
 
 13 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 Fear called, but like the wail of driven fire 
 
 Fanned till the fanning wind is drunk and quelled, 
 
 His passion overmastered her desire. 
 
 As rivers from a sluggish fountain welled 
 
 Spread warmly as they drift against the sea; 
 
 And yet her eyes in downcast modesty 
 
 Faltered as though toward tears: right maidenly 
 
 A blush stole where her bosom sank and swelled. 
 
 "Thou slayest the immortal innocence of heart," 
 She sighed, "for bounties brief that fade and fall." 
 "Both soul and flesh I love," he cried, "Thou art 
 Sheer loveliness, a soul in flower, a call 
 From Heaven to quicken the dull heart of earth. 
 Some rapture of God's spirit gave thee birth. 
 Yea, thou art sister to the clouds, to all 
 
 The brood that sunlight on the summer seas 
 Begetteth for cool pillowing of air: 
 Yet thou art fading too as one of these: 
 Brief bridals now thy flushing beauties wear 
 But darkness falls. Oh God! Even love seems 
 
 lost — 
 Sighed to the gulf of years like blown leaves tossed 
 Seaward from branches clashing, cold and bare. 
 
 U 
 
Youth*s Pilgrimage 
 
 Oh drink earth's stoup of joy and if love die 
 Let it die warmly! Come and I shall fold 
 Its flower 'twixt thy breast and mine, to lie 
 Garnered immortal hours from the cold, 
 To quicken with perpetual birth each dawn, 
 Grown older than the moon, until the wan 
 And jealous starlight break to sunny gold 
 
 Upon the morning hills. Have you not seen 
 Two wrens like lovers wooing in the trees 
 And watched them weave a nest of grey and green, 
 A little house of summer and warm ease; 
 And then their speckled eggs on the downy litter, 
 And then the yellow mouths that reach and twitter, 
 And last, faint fledglings fluttering in the breeze? 
 
 Joy, innocence are there. Dear child, it seems 
 The very flowers are more wise than we; 
 The soundless passage of a summer dream 
 Seems not less real and beautiful to me 
 Than this blind maze wherein our lives entwine. 
 Thy flowerlike frail form is not as mine. 
 As though to some deep purpose we combine 
 Our various flesh in deathless unity." 
 
 15 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 She trembled as he spoke — trembled as one 
 That feels the breath of tempests or the sweep 
 Of surging waters or the voiceless run 
 Of time, drag down his life and may not weep 
 The loss too dear for sorrow, but being brave 
 Bends to the tempest or the searching wave, 
 Then, first of all his days, tastes joys that lave 
 His eyelids like cool summonings of sleep. 
 
 Her heart cried, but her lips for shame were dumb, 
 "Oh man, my life, my soul are thine to spend! 
 Go, I will follow ; lead and I will come — 
 Where hills are highest or dark waters bend 
 Under the knees of mountains!" but he heard 
 Not the faint whisper of that breathless word 
 And cried at last, "Too long my life is penned 
 
 In this deceiving realm where the fairest flowers 
 Root in the deepest murk of earth. I go 
 To search life's secrets mid the chastening showers 
 Of cold and biting rain ; where shrill winds blow 
 Wild trumpet to the lightnings and deep thunder 
 Booms to the echoing crags: where earthquakes 
 
 sunder 
 The stolid hearts of mountains and the flow 
 
 i6 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 Of streams hath moaning passion for the sea. 
 The deep wood calls my feet and I grow fonder 
 Of silence than of song. But now for thee 
 The dance waits on the meadow. I shall wandei 
 Along this stream down to the crimson gate 
 Where through the distant siren voice of Fate 
 Calls to forbidden ears, and there await 
 Thy parting word." Her cheeks grew white, but 
 wonder 
 
 Died in her flashing eyes ere he had gone 
 
 Lost in the flutter of leaves. The woodland delves 
 
 Were tenantless, but on each upland lawn 
 
 And on each mead that seaward slopes and shelves 
 
 Young troups of boys were dancing to glad notes 
 
 First fluttered from warm nests, in virgin throats 
 
 Of maidens singing nooked like woodland elves. 
 
 Lo! One all garlanded with yellow clover: 
 Like great gold stars swarmed in a summer sky 
 They lay amid her hair's dim beauty. Over 
 Another's brow dark ivy leaves did try 
 Soft touch to mend the pale perfection there. 
 Young numerous loveliness, too loath, too rare 
 For my rude quill to mar with earthen dye. 
 
 17 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 To their bright choir came deep eyed Rosabel 
 With measures strange to chide their merry singing: 
 Chiming what consort round her tower did swell, 
 To whose wild notes the nimble echoes ringing 
 Raged to repentant silences. The sea 
 Swept shoreward to be wooed and wonderingly 
 Warded its stillness where no birds were winging. 
 
 Deep in a covert mid the silent leaves 
 Her lover lingered, till the chant was ended 
 Melting in mazy murmur that receives 
 New sinuous sweetness from warm paths it wend- 
 ed— 
 Dwelling in sunlight on the odorant airs, 
 Drooping to earth down twenty twining stairs 
 Among the boughs whose moaning it hath mended. 
 
 The world, the sky were mute until the harp 
 Of the wide hearkening hills rehearsed her numbers, 
 Thrilling the earth's celled stillness with the sharp 
 Sting of remembered labors lapsed in slumbers 
 Too rathely reft. The descant of the sea 
 Wakes in droned dreariment. The strutted bee 
 Glutting with golden gain his flight encumbers. 
 
 i8 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 Then Philemon turned, sighing, "I can bear 
 
 No old companions of my boyish mirth; 
 
 No eyes to mark my stains; no heart to share 
 
 My sorrows but the eyeless heart of earth. 
 
 And Rosabel's. Oh may sweet pity find 
 
 Love through my fault to keep her close and kind 
 
 Until old love begets a second birth!" 
 
 He burrowed down through delves of cool caress 
 
 Into the silence of untrodden ways. 
 
 Where trailing vines in futile tenderness 
 
 Held his still neighborings with soft delays. 
 
 And then before him rose the crimson gate 
 
 Where he must rest till sunset and await 
 
 His love, slow stealing through the purple haze. 
 
 "Aye, if she come," he cried. Beyond the door 
 
 That, like a ruby in dull sandstone set, 
 
 Centered his eyes, there came a sullen roar 
 
 Of countless marching multitudes, the fret 
 
 Of battling ocean and the wail of tense 
 
 And white fanged storm, and afterwards long 
 
 silence. 
 The listener stirred no breath till his brow was wet 
 
 19 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 With feverish dew, and then he rose and flung 
 
 Ajar the brazen dosel of the door, 
 
 And on a dry turf sprang, knee deep among 
 
 A realm of flowery sunsets. Lo! The floor 
 
 Of this new region floated to the sea 
 
 In waves of violet hillbrows, and the lea 
 
 Lay purpled like calm waters far from shore, 
 
 Attired in unnumbered loveliness: 
 Clover and violet, robes of christening Spring, 
 And asters dropped from Heaven's gate to bless 
 Autumnal fervors fled. The seasons cling 
 Dreamfully here with azure arms entwined 
 Babe on the breast of mother, sleeping, vined 
 By clouds that hover like an angel's wing. 
 
 The little door slid shut without one sound ; 
 He found no sign of it how hard he peered ; 
 Only a grim grey wall that reached around 
 Coldly, as something to be greatly feared. 
 A twig snapped in the thicket, and he turned 
 To greet a man in whose old eyes there burned 
 Dim fires, that scarce enobled or endeared. 
 
 20 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 "Alas, my son," he cried, ''You look too late! 
 No hour spent returns ; no will can stem 
 The marching tide of time. That little gate 
 Is shut on Childhood's joys. Remember them 
 But look for them no more. Here shalt thou find 
 The elect whom mounting passions may not blind 
 Nor lend false heart for strife or stratagem. 
 
 "We are a kindly and a temperate race; 
 A twilight folk, for I am one of these: 
 We walk life's border and have skill to trace 
 Afar, the fangs of serpent twining ease 
 Sapping the scarlet from the lips of men: 
 Afar — aye very far, my eyes can ken 
 The myrmidons that battle and then cease, 
 
 "The hosts that throb with passion and then cool, 
 
 Cruel or sharp as jags of Arctic snow; 
 
 The laboring monarch and the fatted fool, 
 
 The great ones risen high by creeping low 
 
 To kiss the feet of empire, or to shower 
 
 Soft praises on the harlot of the hour 
 
 To win one nod of favor ere they go. 
 
 21 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 "We watch and smile but neither reap nor sow." 
 A crowd of men and women through the vale 
 Tripped by them as he spoke with footing slow; 
 And some were simpering and some were pale^ — 
 Smooth empty faces dull, but gently kind, 
 Or dim and studious eyes, but all grown blind 
 Alike to loveliness of bower or dale. 
 
 "May I be one of ye?" cried Philemon, 
 "And with ye drain life's rummer to the lees, 
 To search the seepings whose corruptions run 
 Toward death, and master birth's warm mysteries?" 
 Some gnawed their fingers when he spake and some 
 Simpered and others trembling and grown dumb 
 Made show to turn aside their timorous eyes. 
 
 The old man bit his beard and rumbled out, 
 "Birth and begetting — shame of shames and sin 
 Of hideous sins! Go seek some wanton rout 
 In yonder forest where deeds shameless, win 
 The thunder of deep curses from God's tongue, 
 And there find answer. Shameless and so young!" 
 And "Shameless," shrilled his crew in voices thin. 
 
 22 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 He left them then and pulsed with easier breath 
 To hear their sly sneers and contagious scorn 
 Wane on the queasy wind; but even death 
 And life partook this sin of being born! 
 "The birds axe shameful then and the seeding 
 
 flowers," 
 He cried. "There seems no beauty in life's hours 
 Save stars and moonlight and the purpling morn!" 
 
 His heart denied his tongue, and long he stood 
 
 Blended by inward lightnings, all amaze, 
 
 Like a young doe far from its mothering wood 
 
 While all the earth is smitten with the blaze 
 
 Of hostile fire and disrooting storm, 
 
 Then silence and sunlight: skies grown sudden 
 
 warm 
 And blighted beauty in familiar form. 
 Fragrant and calling, through the chastened brays. 
 
 The murmur of the waterfalls that leap 
 Down from the land of Childhood to the sea, 
 Commercing of its fragrance utters sleep 
 Whose balmy pillowings and melodious plea 
 Soothed the poor sated eyes. And there a mound 
 Invited with soft bedding leaves, hedged round 
 With fragrant pines. "I'll lie beneath some tree,'* 
 
 23 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 He murmured, half a dream, "And watch the sun 
 Turn Midas at the twilight." Ere he gained 
 The hilltop, sleep forsook the web she spun 
 To veil his eye's blue beauty. Wonder reigned 
 Lone naiad then in all their watery deeps 
 And in his fervid heart new kingdom keeps: 
 For he hath clambered to the peak, hot veined 
 
 To gulp the brimming bounty of the land 
 At one unbreathing drain: the hills, the sea, 
 The long white wall that girdled like a band 
 The Tyrian plush of earth's fertility, 
 And to the south, beyond the hills, the loom 
 Of bleak and awful forests in whose gloom 
 White sudden faces seemed to peer, and flee 
 
 Deeper into their den of dark within. 
 
 He mused, "Have I not seen some woodland thing: 
 
 Hoar Sagittarian with bearded chin 
 
 Through hazel copse the tear eyed fawn pursuing, 
 
 Or brown haired Dryad starting from her tree 
 
 Armful of golden missives, tremblingly 
 
 Cast on the brook's face to advance her wooing? 
 
 24 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 Or was it one rare glint of sunlight claiming 
 Warm nurture of a Maenad's tressy brow? 
 Or was it some strange creature past my naming ? 
 Even as he mused the neighboring hedges bow 
 And part with timorous urge of rosy fingers; 
 Then, faltering like a maiden bride who lingers 
 To make more dear the purchase of her vow 
 
 A woman came, veiled in a mist of blue 
 Caught out of the young heavens to disguise 
 The firm and rosy flesh, that flushing through 
 Like mountain heads at dawn against the skies, 
 Seemed builded out of sunlight and high air 
 To woofs more cloud ensnaring and more rare; 
 Above like sunrise streamed her golden hair. 
 But there were velvet bands across her eyes. 
 
 She gazed on him, and swaying as she stood, 
 His eyes drank in the wonder of her form. 
 Searching her gracious wealth of womanhood. 
 Its loveliness and verdure, shyly warm. 
 She caught the tribute of his eyes and said, 
 "I am not of yon pale folk, living dead, 
 That have no tongue for tasting sun or storm ! 
 
 25 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 "I live where men are mighty, and the fresh 
 And vital beauty of the earth has sway; 
 Where spirit calls to spirit, and flesh to flesh; 
 Where joy and pain and passion, sweep and sway 
 The writhing hearts of men as storm sways trees 
 That scarp the northern passage of the seas 
 And bend and sing, yet grow more green and grey. 
 
 "Our glory warm begetting, death and birth 
 
 And all the sunny joys that lie between: 
 
 Pain making deep the loveliness of earth; 
 
 Eyes passion-fondling where blind peace hath been.'* 
 
 "Tell me," he cried, "Is there no shame in this?" 
 
 "No shame," she sighed, "Save where grim virtue 
 
 is — 
 Shame in no birth nor shame in any bliss 
 That warms from smiles and dies into a kiss; 
 If there be foulness speak when thou hast seen!" — 
 
 Beyond the wide arms of the eastern wall 
 Faint through the mellowing veil of evening mist 
 A plumed tower rose divinely tall ; 
 Like white spars meshed in ocean's amethyst 
 It seemed to sway on piers too frail to bear 
 Its burden, — like a cloud twixt earth and air; 
 Frail scuds of vapor yellow like long hair 
 Fell round the stains day's dying fervor kissed. 
 
 26 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 Lo on its side a gate of crimson fold 
 
 Gave sudden passage to a streaming flood 
 
 That pooled about the tower and unrolled 
 
 The sunset sky sunk in a sea of blood. 
 
 Like plumes of pines by hostile tempests driven, 
 
 Like mountains by the taloned earthquake riven, 
 
 Like ghosts that face the throne of God unshriven, 
 
 The tower writhed and faltered where it stood; 
 
 And then fled faltering through the oozy door 
 
 A child white browed like one faint fluttering star 
 
 Lured from the porch of Heaven, and then one more. 
 
 With timorous rosy limbs and feet that were 
 
 It seemed scarce mated to the rugged earth, 
 
 All trembling at the tumult of their birth, 
 
 And frail like angels that have flown too far. 
 
 Then silence fell like sleep. The children fled 
 Now, hillward finding savor of their striving: 
 One only lingered, whom the honied head 
 Of clover tempted oft to tasteful hiving: 
 Nuzzling her lips to nibble cool delights 
 And bounding o'er the grass in little flights 
 To suck each sheaf reared for her shy depriving. 
 
 27 
 
Youth^s Pilgrhnage 
 
 Ah! She is gone and Philemon hath traced 
 Along the wall the glimmer of her hair 
 Gliding toward darkness like a moon erased 
 Timelessly by great waters: then the bare 
 Stark loveliness of even stirred toward sleep. 
 The woman cried, "Night comes and thou must 
 
 keep 
 Vigilant eyelids, for dim Death doth creep 
 Serpentwise through the trees and wintering air." 
 
 Lo! His first victim comes: a gleam, a quiver 
 
 Like white wings poising through the mazy sheaves 
 
 Of larches denizened by doves; a shiver 
 
 And toss of the low furze that clings and cleaves 
 
 Writhen in timeless birth; a slender shape 
 
 Pilloried with caught hair against the gape 
 
 Of trembling branches — hair like autumn leaves 
 
 Sun-mellowed a long harvest time: she starts 
 Palsied with blinking terror at the light, 
 Shakes her proud head until the bright strands part. 
 Shrinks darkly, then bursts forth with sudden flight 
 Footing now air, now flowers, with rosy flash 
 Of slender frantic limbs. A dewy lash 
 Hovereth like the weeping clouds of night 
 
 28 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 That drench a glorious sunset. "She hath seen," 
 
 He thought, "Eternal sorrows bud to jo}^; 
 
 Her nights have mellowed with the lonely teen 
 
 Of tears, and caught calm wisdom of the cloy 
 
 And solitude of grief that weeping mars. 
 
 Her eyes have drunken silence of the stars." 
 
 Over the purple tod on high employ 
 
 They guide ; she lifts and flies ; a door looms wide 
 And gulps her like the reach of waiting arms. 
 A bell booms thrice and lo! On every side 
 Bent forms creep forth to welcome its alarms. 
 The high trees sigh with universal breathing: 
 Forth dart high breasted youths with myrtle wreath- 
 ing 
 Their brows, and ivy culled with woodland charms 
 
 To crown a holiday. Wind towsled hair 
 
 Back fluttered like pale languid flames; the sheen 
 
 Of sunset played soft lightnings on thighs bare 
 
 Above the trailing of their garments green. 
 
 One maid, white fleshed in billowing beauty, bore 
 
 HeedfuUy high a cup half drained. She wore 
 
 A fillet of white roses, and between 
 
 29 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 Each rose a whiter blossom of the tree: 
 And after her another, then one more: 
 Like eddies landward folding on the lea 
 Of purple waters to the summoning shore 
 Swept the tumultuous tide, and lo! The yawn 
 Of that dark door hath sucked the fairest; on 
 Whelmeth the tardy spindrift then, outpour 
 
 Of queasy pools. With mulling lips they tarried 
 
 And tossed complaining fingers to the sun, 
 
 Beside hoar sires whose tottering haste they harried 
 
 To barter for delay. The plea begun 
 
 Spent querulously and the lips grew still — 
 
 So passed they one by one, the fair, the ill, 
 
 Sere shoots, lush younglings by one frost foredone, 
 
 Lapsed sunlessly alike to little dooms. 
 
 One Cometh last, aslant the craggy shore 
 
 Paltering up the sea bank, with the blooms 
 
 Of ocean ribboning his hair. The pour 
 
 Of dribbling brine made patter on the leaves 
 
 Where through he crooks his clammy way. He 
 
 heaves 
 Wearily back his head, to blink once more 
 
 30 
 
Youth^s Pilgri?nage 
 
 The fervor of the sun. Blue gaunt and old 
 He stood. His rolling eyeballs could not wink 
 Their matted coverlids; the flowers would fold 
 And fade he looked on. From their dooms ashrink 
 He hunched to the bleaker wall ; the door gaped 
 
 black ; 
 He stared with cunning lurch; peered in; leaped 
 
 back; 
 Then sidelong through the gate with hideous slink 
 
 Made passage to the dark. . . . The gazers 
 
 shifted 
 Slow sated eyes, now left, now right; the hill 
 In Youth's smooth slumbers lay ; a grass blade lifted 
 Sharply with sputter of dew ; the whip-poor-will 
 Had cadenced in the tw^ilight; not the stirring 
 Of one slow slender leaf forbade the purring 
 Of sorrow searching waterfalls, that still 
 
 Monotonous music forth and solemnize 
 
 The vespers of the violet. Like a flower 
 
 Unfolding sudden fragrance to the skies. 
 
 Or jasmine wooing night moths to its bower 
 
 By odorous magic of its suing breath, 
 
 The woman rose, and murmured, "Birth and 
 
 Death — 
 These hast thou seen, and now it is the hour 
 
 31 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 When I am gathered to the hosts that throng 
 High revels in the wilderness of night, 
 And greet the passionate moon with Bromian song. 
 So I must leave thee." Did his eyes invite 
 The trembling challenge that her bosom gave? 
 Or did her hurried breathings droop to crave 
 Some sweeter surfeit of more dear delight? 
 
 The wind with sudden gust unloosed her hair 
 And bathed in fragrant folds his brow and eyes, 
 And widening her loose robe, swept warm and bare 
 Her throbbing bosom's fountained mysteries, 
 Hungry for kisses, dimpling for the press 
 Of fondling fingers, and the warm caress 
 Of staining lips to bid the warm blood rise. 
 
 Her hair was tingling round him and his brain 
 Swam in a sea of passion, bold but blind. 
 The blood was sighing in his bursting veins; 
 And then she swayed and then their arms entwined ; 
 The foison of her flaming womanhood 
 Lay burning in his fingers. Through the wood 
 No sound was ushered save the soothing wind 
 
 32 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 Whose sobbing murmur sued upon his ear 
 Pregnant with memory; and through the leaves 
 The pines' sharp searching savor seemed to bear 
 Reproach of sunny hillsides and the sheaves 
 Of gathered daisies and the dappled lav^rn; 
 Of rosy dancing feet that flamed thereon 
 Leaping like sunlight toward the sinking sun, 
 And pigeons cooing in the twilight eaves. 
 
 "Oh God!" he cried, "My soul be master still!" 
 Then caught a breath that drove the cooling air 
 Deep in his fainting breast, like winter's chill 
 Down riven to some sultry valley lair 
 From heads of indistinguishable mountains. 
 Whitening song to snow; joy's tressy fountains 
 Knitting in pallid skeins of frozen hair. 
 
 Feebly he faltered from the hot embrace 
 And broke the cincture of her chaining arms; 
 He spoke but dared not look upon her face 
 Whose baffled blood took flight in mute alarms: 
 And then shame's sluggish flood did stem, and start 
 Back from the violation of her heart. 
 And then fear whitened on each tender part 
 Like swift snow rained from out a sunset storm. 
 
 33 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 "Oh woman! woman! Help me to be strong," 
 He cried with man's triumphant selfishness, 
 "Surely in bliss so high there lurks great wrong 
 For love should flame when bosoms bend and press ; 
 This mutual joy welds like the tongues of fire 
 Bodies and souls that mate in high desire 
 And merge and meld in mutual tenderness. 
 
 " 'Tis that not you nor I should aught profane 
 This rite so hoarded through life's secret hours, 
 But guard the vigilant fire of this fane 
 And set its door in being's inmost bowers, 
 So when the true high chosen acolyte 
 Knocks at the last our clear joy may invite 
 To share the untasted banquet of delight 
 In innocence and beauty like young flowers; 
 
 "Look, thou hast shown me Death; I found it wise 
 Daring or hideous as men may choose. 
 I gazed on Birth and wondered with wet eyes. 
 And last I ken joy's clearest ray that embrues 
 Love even, needing least, with deepest grain, 
 Making soul manifest through murk and stain, 
 But if the soul be banished shrunk or slain 
 The hidden dearth betrays its paltry shows," 
 
 34 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 The woman rose and hid her wounded eyes 
 And bound her robe right stiffly cross her breast. 
 These words she spake, "The innocence that lies 
 Folden in flowers that the warm airs invest 
 With tarnishing and little current gold, 
 Crisps and grows countless when the clouds uprolled 
 Blight and devour and the frosts come cold 
 Out of the aging bosom of the west. 
 
 "Then innocence chills to a frozen pride 
 
 Like ancient blood that shirks the breeding soil, 
 
 Or like the jeweled fingers of a bride 
 
 Proudly aloof the murk of tainting toil. 
 
 Then cruddled or grown swale when youth is done 
 
 Grows to a thing that wise men smile upon 
 
 But all men flee whose hopes it may despoil; 
 
 "Joys too long hoarded when disclosed at last 
 Are like fair apples garnered gainst the cold. 
 Dearly held ofE till Autumn's need is past 
 And Winter yields a shriveled few and old, 
 Crabbed and bitter to the frozen tongue. 
 Spend like a wanton then while lust is young: 
 Time maketh chill the touch of gathered gold." 
 
 35 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 She waited for no answer, but was gone 
 Swift as a sigh amid the cleaving flowers, 
 And left him deep disconsolate and lone 
 To mark the droning passage of the hours; 
 To call, until his throbbing heart was flung 
 Into the panting fervor of his tongue, 
 "Oh Rosabel, lie safe in Childhood's bowers 
 
 "Cool innocence sway round thy mossy sleep. 
 But dream of me, O love! Let memory 
 Purge me in that clean fountain that doth keep 
 The luster of thy warm virginity — 
 Oh fair love, dream of me!" The searching cry 
 Roamed through night's hollow chambers drearily. 
 And the grey w^ll echoed "Dream, O Dream of me." 
 
 "I have kept faith," he cried, "O Rosabel, 
 
 With love, with thee; I care not if 'twere wise 
 
 To leave joy's showered blossoms where they fell — 
 
 The innocence of thine untutored eyes 
 
 Is with me now. Aye, and my will shall keep 
 
 Thy body from the license of my sleep 
 
 Safe from my dream's despoiling ecstasies." 
 
 36 
 
Youth's Pilgrimage 
 
 A murmur thrilled the leaves even as he spoke: 
 Swift feet pressed through the flowers, like a song 
 Wooed from the gathered corn by the tender stroke 
 Of Autumn's airy raiment, and along 
 The hill path with soft whispers of his name, 
 With call of reaching arms, a woman came 
 And kneeling, sank before him with no shame. 
 Crying, "Oh look on me, then be thou strong 
 
 **In love as thou hast stalwart been in faith, 
 If thou dost love." "Aye, girl, I love so well," 
 He cried, "That thou seemest scarce such wind 
 
 wrought wraith 
 Of naked beauty even, this flesh fed spell 
 Forms, from the lees of passion in my heart. 
 Begone!" "Look once on me and I depart," 
 She cried. He turned: her veiling hair did part 
 And showed the kindling eyes of Rosabel. 
 
 37 
 
Youth*s Pilgrimage 
 
 Voiceless he gazed; then through the twilight dart- 
 ing 
 Timorous as a fawn she came ; the reach 
 Of wide flung arms; a cry; the glad lips parting; 
 A sigh like the sea as they melted each to each. 
 They sank with mingled hair, the black and gold 
 Woven like patterning moonlight on the old 
 Dark floor of forests, and their souls impleach 
 With fellowship of intermingled fate 
 
 Like oak and ivy that have grown together. 
 
 And make their gentle lives a single date, 
 
 And bend or rise before the stress of weather 
 
 As but a single being, neer apart. 
 
 So these two lovers lingered heart to heart. 
 
 At last she murmured, *'Love, no time shall sever 
 
 "Lives knit by passion and through pain grown 
 
 wise." 
 His lips made answer, and they turned and slept 
 Pillowed on clover heads. Their wearied eyes 
 Were gauzed with trembling canopies that had crept 
 Whitely from lily cups to shield their dreams. 
 His arm now steals across her brow and gleams 
 Slenderly pale as though the moon had kept 
 
 38 
 
Youth^s Pilgrimage 
 
 Her youngling out of heaven to ward their bed. 
 Pale glow flys searched deep caverns in her hair, 
 And for a cresset at his feet was shed 
 Incense of lambent larkspur. Oh to share 
 Those visions Youth! To drift with thee along 
 The hyaline of sleep and heed a song 
 That beckons with far call the fainting air 
 
 Whose bosom is thy pillow! And to glide 
 
 To shelves of moon bathed islands white with pearls 
 
 New garnered at the sinking of the tide! 
 
 To sluice my feet and count the scudding whirls 
 
 Wherein the moon doth paint a thousand faces, 
 
 To drain with thee sweet springs in shadowy places 
 
 Whose canopies are rose leaves and the furls 
 
 Of orchis, twined like crisps of golden hair 
 Clipped from pink cupids on their christening morn, 
 That mate each quivering star with one more fair, 
 Skied in lone amethyst of dew drops born 
 Hoarded from chrismal showers! Oh to drink 
 Cool gulping in such solitudes and sink 
 Dreamlessly into silence ere the morn! 
 
 39