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Polonius What do you read, ni}- lord? 
 Hamlet. Words, words, words! 
 
THRICE WORDS 
 
 OR RHYMES OR REASONS • 
 BY 
 
 JOHN WILLIAM CONWAY 
 
 "Men have ever built 
 Their own small world in the great world of all." 
 
 —Goethe. 
 
 KANSAS 
 
 The Norton Champion 
 1894 
 
 *^'MAYi* 1894 ) 
 
 

 Copyrig-ht, 1894, by 
 J. W. CONWAY. 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. 
 I HE author has expended considerable pa- 
 tience and money in carrying and conceal- 
 ing a hundred or more poems in his trunk for 
 the last twenty years. He takes this opportu- 
 nity to air a few, employing his own idle press 
 and type for the purpose. 
 
CONTENTS: 
 
 
 This Book 
 
 1 
 
 Invocation 
 
 3 
 
 Fishy. 
 
 7 
 
 Rose and Moss 
 
 8 
 
 Metempsychosis . 
 
 10 
 
 Sonnet 
 
 13 
 
 Battle Flag-s 
 
 14 
 
 Two Mottoes 
 
 • . 16 
 
 The Ivost Prayer 
 
 18 
 
 Cassandra 
 
 20 
 
 Experiments 
 
 23 
 
 Toute a Toi . 
 
 24 
 
 A Smiling- Judge 
 
 26 
 
 To Father 
 
 28 
 
 Sir Butterfly 
 
 33 
 
 To Elder B . 
 
 34 
 
 Centennial Hopes 
 
 38 
 
 ^sop's Hare 
 
 41 
 
 Sweet Life 
 
 43 
 
 Sub Rosa 
 
 44 
 
 Traitors . 
 
 46 
 
 Venus sans Adonis 
 
 48 
 
 Honesty Non Est 
 
 . ,54 
 
 A Christmas Gift . 
 
 56 
 
 Echo 
 
 65 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 
 M. Estelle G. . . . 
 
 66 
 
 On a Pamting- 
 
 68 
 
 Gtiinevere's Ivaiuent 
 
 70 
 
 Star of the East 
 
 75 
 
 Dying- the Rose . 
 
 ^7 
 
 Chicag-o 
 
 81 
 
 June .... 
 
 82 
 
 The Poesy of a Rin.g 
 
 84 
 
 A Fellow Traveler 
 
 88 
 
 Patholog-y of Tears 
 
 92 
 
 Court of Honor 
 
 98 
 
 An Arizona Tomb . 
 
 99 
 
 A Cynic's Tale . . 
 
 115 
 
 Cards— Whist 
 
 122 
 
 The Joker 
 
 123 
 
 Fortunes 
 
 123 
 
 Edith . . . . 
 
 138 
 
 The Red, Red West 
 
 140 
 
 Inez' Song . . ' . 
 
 141 
 
 Sonnets— Cliff Dweller 
 
 142 
 
 Prof. Wynn . 
 
 143 
 
 Post Mortem 
 
 144 
 
 The Sonnet 
 
 145 
 
 The Suicide 
 
 145 
 
 The Poet 
 
 147 
 
 Truth 
 
 148 
 
 Sea Foam, a fragment 
 
 149 
 
'*Say much where little should be said, 
 lyay ou thy censure dextrously." 
 
 — A n drew L a iig . 
 
'J^ HIS BOOK is like a grave where dreams 
 Sleep 171 repose allied to death 
 Which intimates another life; it seems 
 The tomb of thoughts, zahims, heroes, themes, - 
 Will they live after? Fancy' s breath 
 Dilates the nostrils of their clay 
 And hope looks to the judgment day 
 When critics pointing to the right or 
 Left, damns with faint praise me, the ivriter. 
 
INVOCATION. 
 
 (WITH APOI^OGIES.) 
 
 '*A poet born" has not been proudly written 
 In burnished letters on my natal star, 
 
 Nor by the wan Nine madly am I smitten 
 To rave in verse as real poets are. 
 
 No lover who unbosoms shafts of Cupid 
 
 Shot in the dark, aimed blindly at the neck. 
 
 Am I; than be arraig-ned such blooming- dupe I'd 
 With horns or cap and bells my skull bedeck. 
 
 No poet but a Kansan — for my health: 
 
 The prairies swarm with invalids who feel ease 
 
 In every robust enterprise for wealth, 
 All patriots — and tig-hters like Achilles. 
 
4 INVOCATION. 
 
 No madman either; tho' daft luneling seeurs 
 The m^odern rhym^er who dares publish verses 
 
 To tell like spookish dame his nightly dreams, 
 
 Or day dreams for that matter, which far worse is. 
 
 To one who outlined finished character, 
 
 As Euclid figures, with few lines to fetter a 
 
 Conception to full vision, I refer 
 In poet, madman, lover one, etc. 
 
 Were I implored to waste an invocation 
 On certain muses famous in the Greek, 
 
 I should obeying lose a rare occasion 
 To glorify a theory more unique. 
 
 This specimen may not be so adroit 
 As to evade bards who scale Hellas lamely; 
 
 It may lack Attic salt, be fresh, be raw; 't 
 Is legalized in words and symbols, namely: 
 
INVOCATION. 
 
 Hail, Kansas, Muse of Advertising-, hail! 
 
 Inspire your bard to measure rhythmic feet 
 Of rhyme smooth as your zephyr, or if stale 
 
 The phrase, terrific as your cyclone be 't. 
 
 Hail, Kansas, puifed-up Muse the Tenth, as I'm 
 Informed! Beyond Parnassus you must elbow 
 
 Your starward course, o'er difficulties climb, 
 
 Drouths, gfrasshoppers, detractors who to hell g-o. 
 
 Hail, Kansas! or if weary hailing-, storm! 
 
 Storm every adverse critic in his castle, 
 Which, shake from moat to barbacan, alarm 
 
 Sarcastic wits with your wild razzle dazzle. 
 
 Rant, hail, fume, storm, my fickle Kansas Muse, 
 
 But after come all calm!— 
 
 (Aside) Dank Ivcthe's waters 
 Dividing fire from ice can not produce 
 
 Forgetful contraries to equal aug-ht hers. 
 
INVOCATION. 
 
 Pure air, brig-ht skies enamoured are of Kansasi 
 While similies impoverish marbled Italy — 
 
 Pink, wrinkled, painted Italy! No man says 
 It rivals Kansas' clime not knowing- it a lie. 
 
 Smile, sunny Kansas! that an inspiration 
 
 Is in itself and of its own accord; 
 Your sunbath adds new life, is re-creation. 
 
 Puts burning* eloquence in heart and word. 
 
 With such a State (and, printer, emphasize 
 Initial S) with such a m.use here hinted, 
 
 Touch pen, touch paper! gained is laurel prize 
 While liquid poetry flows on unstinted. 
 
 So, Kansas, kindly muse, return some favor 
 To one who sweat, froze, starved for you — and lied; 
 
 While neither has indulg-ed the best behavior. 
 Puff lavishly — the critics I'll deride. 
 
FISHY. 
 
 Fisherman. Rolf, what fish did swallow Jonah? 
 R01.F. A whale. 
 
 — Harold. 
 
 A \xm,% learning- hath been called a thing- 
 Of dang-er; here the error in cetology 
 Amazes scientists in this wild fling: 
 
 At rabble ig-norance whose voice is free 
 
 To slander thus our mammal of the sea. 
 Who is the Jonah? Rolf, unless you wish 
 To blig-ht the laureled Tennyson, tho' he 
 
 In earnest or in sarcasm serve this dish 
 Of blubbered paradox: The whale is not a fish. 
 
ROSE AND MOBS. 
 
 A ivUMP of moss found by a charming" child 
 ^ -^In her romancing' in the woodland wild, 
 
 And cherished as a dollhonse ornament— 
 A forest fall of bears — so cast around 
 
 Mag*nificent aroma, sweete»t scent, 
 Delicious perfume and exhaleirtents mild, 
 
 That all inquired where the moss was found-' 
 
 And in her wondrous meaning-, childly wise. 
 With clapping- hands, and wide dilating- eyes, 
 
 The little maiden answered: "Don't you know? 
 This moss so long beneath rose leaves entombed^^ — 
 
 A petal shedding" rose did o'er it g-row 
 For years and years where yonder woodland sig-hs— - 
 
 That thus the moss was by the rose perfiimed-'' 
 
ROSE AND MOSS. Q 
 
 If we more closely nestled to the flowers 
 
 Of thoug-ht shed by the mind in summer hours, 
 
 The sweets of years would so perfume our lives 
 That such aroma cast in full completeness 
 
 Would fill earth's chambers, as the bees their hives, 
 With honey-words, g-ood deeds our neig-hbors' dowers 
 
 Till all about us moss-like caug"ht the sweetness. 
 
lO 
 
 METEMPSYCHOSIS. 
 
 XN the beg-itinmg- simple Truth was naked, 
 
 And Charity in gforg-eous mantle clad; 
 But when they came their worldy trips to make, it 
 Transpired that both g-ave up their ancient fad. 
 
 The wealth of human frailties g-rew so shocking- 
 
 That Charity to cover all her care, 
 First cast her cloak, chemise, next g-own and stocking- 
 
 Until the modest creature wandered — bare. 
 
 Now Charity has not a patch of linen 
 
 To cover half the follies of mankind; 
 Thus stands exposed the amplitude of sin in 
 
 Our fellow mortals few of whom are blind. 
 
MKTEMPSYCHOSlS. II 
 
 Reg-arding- Truth? Well, she in dishabille 
 Was undisting-uished from our robeless ilk; 
 
 To mark a contrast Truth put on a frill, 
 
 A smock, a robe, and blossomed forth in silk. 
 
 Richly elaborate her g-audy train 
 
 Sweeps over everything- in loud attire; 
 
 Truth's proper person still without a stain, 
 Her g-arments g-et bedabbled in the mire. 
 
 In proud habiliments the lady walks 
 
 On earth disguised, tho' Truth remains true; so 
 
 Invention merely human, writes and talks 
 In ornate lang-uag-e of her g-ay trousseau. 
 
 To recognize her now we certain laws lack 
 In cyphering her orbit 'neath the skies: 
 
 As well seek vanished needle in a strawstack 
 As make a quest of verity's disguise. 
 
1,2 MKIEM PSYCHOS IS. 
 
 Not that Truth vanished from the earth, now note nie, 
 Nor that sweet Charity in hiding- lurks; 
 
 You may in your report, however, quote me 
 As dubbing- them a brace of flirting- shirks. 
 
 There is a dearth of truth and charity; 
 
 Comparison is coy to name the less — 
 Paul nominated one when vied some three, 
 
 Truth absent, g-reatest; g-reatef now is Dress. 
 
 Involved in quandary are we for style 
 And errors unredressed, as each exposes 
 
 Her pristine character reversed; the while 
 Men marvel at the strangle metempsychosis. 
 
13 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 TTERE is a rosebush, called the creeping- rose, 
 
 To plant upon my dead boy's g-rave, that, by 
 And by, when Time permits myself to lie 
 Beside him in the thraldom of repose, 
 (Not sleeping-, I mean dead) it may disclose 
 Rare bloom in friendly season. It will pry 
 Aside the weeds and g-rass to creep where I 
 Shall be — thus emulate my babe — and pose 
 Its rose-lips in an open laug^h above 
 
 My heart of dust; and when the blossoms fall 
 In their teleg-raphy of noiseless love. 
 Some fond communication from my Paul 
 May thrill electric vines; or, failing-, prove 
 That we are nothing-, and Death all in all. 
 
14 
 
 BATTLE FLAGS. 
 
 ^ ^ 1 ^WAS Sumner said: "Our battle flags will wave 
 
 Unkindly inettiories of a broken dream." 
 Ay, broken by the crimson flowered g-rave 
 Dug in the tearful haste of brothers brave 
 Among the willows where in sadness lave 
 
 The murmuring waters of each southern stream. 
 
 Forget those battle flags?. ^ How hardj^' twill be! 
 
 Their dauntless streaming led us up the height 
 Of burning hope and mountain, when the glee 
 Of laughing cannons mocked us, and the sea 
 Of ^flames ;had swept^to dim eternity 
 
 Our mangled messmates fallen in the fight. 
 
BATTI.K FI.AGS. 15 
 
 Let Southern chivalry give back the dead 
 Who purchased with their blood the flags and field — 
 
 Return the flags because, forsooth, 'tis' said D 
 
 The union in a stronger Union wed 
 
 Is now perpetual? because we dread 
 
 To stir disdain in bossoms forced to yield? 
 
 The heroes of Truth's conquests never die: 
 So, if you will, these battle flags forget. 
 
 I<et them return where southern breezes sigh, 
 
 The home of valor, "seat'of [^chivalry; 
 
 Forego the victor's boast, pass past things by — 
 Thus start a nation' s]^code of etiquette. 
 
i6 
 
 TWO MOTTOES. 
 
 LIFE: Heart to heart. 
 DEA TH: Dust to dust, 
 
 "D Y theory and by proof it hath been shown 
 There is, or is not, a hereafter. Rig-ht! 
 Peace to the dead. I live and reckon none 
 Know how to cherish life's delig-ht 
 
 As those who live for them 
 Who live; the rest is dim 
 To reason's searching- lig-ht. 
 
 "If there is weig-ht in an eternity, 
 
 lyet the grave listen and be graver still," 
 The Avon stoic wrote. Not so; we die, 
 
 And dust to dust; then heart to heart until. 
 
 "Eat, drink, be merry," taught the sage, 
 Corroborating Youth and Age 
 Cry, marry and amen! we will. 
 
TWO MOTTOKS. 1 7 
 
 Let the grave silence us with dust to dust, 
 But bide the silence with a lover's part — 
 True, fervid and devoted; not in lust 
 
 Whose g-audy wing- invites the venomed dart, 
 lyove; 'tis the season, 'tis the bloom; 
 To-morrow dust falls, falls the doom; 
 To-day let heart beat nearer heart. 
 
i8 
 
 THE LOST PRAYER. 
 
 'W THI^N from our portal g-oes the well-tried friend 
 
 Whose way lies to the world of weal or woe. 
 Not knowing-, we exclaim adieu! and send 
 
 The parting- kiss by waving- hand, and lo! 
 The prayer: Good by unto the end. 
 
 Good by? A benediction lost forever ' 
 To random tong-ues; a hurried, panting prayer 
 
 Condensed by quicker heartbeats which thus sever 
 On lips unlettered: God be with you where 
 
 You go, and God be with you ever. 
 
THE LOST prayi:r. 19 
 
 At parting-, then, may God be with you, dear; 
 
 And when the intervening- distance more 
 Than sad words measure, you, perchance, get ear 
 
 Of God be wi' you, — till the voice dies low'r,— 
 God b' y' — good by epitomized you hear. 
 
 Good by! adieu! all one, we fondly try 
 
 To utter in our sorrows, in our tears; 
 Friends come, friends go; unceasing shadows ply 
 
 Their crafts about us in the flood of years, 
 Yet, in the surge or calm beyond — Good by! 
 
2a 
 
 CASSANDRA. 
 
 ^ I "^HERli to and fro upon the Trogan walls, 
 
 Ivike weird moon spectre of sublime distress, 
 
 The raving- daughter of old Priam calls, 
 
 Hands wring-ing, teared amain, and every tress 
 Of her gnarled hair alive with writhing, less 
 
 Than hissing serpents being only hair, 
 Bewailing Ilium; the sorceress 
 
 Unheeded as a maddened damsel fair. 
 
 Her war-like brother Hector warning in despair. 
 
CASSANDRA. 21 
 
 "'Foredoomed, foredoomed!" were her prophetic words 
 To draw the dauntless soldier from the field; 
 
 Her cry of evil omen sable birds 
 
 Of carrion in g-loating- echoes pealed, 
 
 But fell like Greek blows on his smitten shield 
 
 Beneath the force of warning-; nay, they fed 
 His valor to the full so he would yield 
 
 Alone to death — and death attending- shed 
 
 His canopy of darkness over Hector dead. 
 
 Wail, Hecuba; Andromache, bemoan 
 
 Fell ruin come apace; and over all 
 The fate of son and husband overthrown. 
 
 The doom of Troy's proud city soon to fall. 
 
 Cassandra's warning- oft' equivocal 
 Established thus by slig-hting- her appeals 
 
 Finds Hector's corse around the outer wall 
 Drag-g-ed shamefully, no ig-nominy feels 
 Bound to Achilles' ruthless chariot wheels. 
 
22 CASSANDRA. 
 
 O, fatal g-ift of prophesy, to cast 
 
 Before its full probation dire event 
 That none attends until the hour is past 
 
 When divination proves inconsequent! 
 
 Distraug-ht Cassandra subtle in portent 
 By g-ods ordained, was furthermore received 
 
 As fool-capped prophetess by scoffers bent 
 On ridicule; they heard but not believed. 
 And as she raved the more the more themselves 
 deceived. 
 
 Upon the battlements of ag-es stands 
 
 The brain-sick g-irl of bodements making- moan; 
 Words shrill with aug"ury, hair- tearing- hands, 
 Kxcept when one above the pale brow thrown 
 Kncornices the eyes, while things unknown 
 At longest range are scanned. Anon her sight 
 Discerns life's fray — wounds, blood; she hears the 
 
 groan 
 Of dying Nature! — Troy, Greece, Rome too slight 
 For death to catalogue in universal night. 
 
23 
 
 EXPERIMENTS. 
 
 Tlir OLD two soft hands in thine: 
 
 The heart's electric batteries go ting-ling 
 The fingertips with currents tine, 
 
 Enthralling as rich spells of wine, 
 And subtle threads of love will twine 
 Two souls together mingling. 
 
 Two lips join to thine own, 
 
 Her lips whose hands thus in experiment 
 Formed loving circuit: First, a moan 
 X3r sigh, then panting — not alone 
 The secret heart its love has shown 
 In sadness or in merriment. 
 
 All signs are tattlers on 
 
 The lover's heart that, seemingly full well, ails; 
 A thousand mediums will run 
 
 With message quickly to the one 
 Fair creature under heaven's sun — 
 For love all things are tell-tales. 
 
24 
 
 TOUTE A TOI. 
 
 TTE died in Idaho. The clustered hair^ 
 Untang"led as in classical despair, 
 
 Twined round his pallid face full tenderly: 
 A miner welded in heart-passioned fire 
 Whose eag-er hope revealed was proud desire 
 To dig" to hardpan, from which climb the hig^her 
 
 On g'olden ladder rarer man to be. 
 
 But he lay dead, this hero of my theme. 
 Pale as the g"lory of a faded dream; 
 
 His past was mystery, at best forlorn. 
 The frag-ments of a rose was all that he 
 Had on his person of biography, 
 'Neath which she wrote: "Toute a toi. Marie"- 
 
 And under, he: "All withered — but the thorn." 
 
TOUTK A TOI. 25 
 
 Death is the moralist who stood above 
 These broken elements of dream and love. 
 
 Of hope, despair, and death let fly his dart. 
 Chasing- the prismy threads of rainbow g"old 
 This lover of unknown Marie had rolled 
 Away the secret mountain to unfold 
 
 A wealth of ang-uish pressing- on his heart. 
 
 O what a scrap of history is here 
 Of him, of her, of tales that murmur near 
 The broken heart! All withered, all deceits; — 
 The rosy smiles, the pollened words and all 
 Those pledg-ing- petals that sweet hours recall — 
 All withered but the thorn, the prick, the ga.ll, 
 The cvnic monument o'er bitter-sweets. 
 
26 
 
 A SMILING JUDGE. 
 
 *' \ MAN may smile and smile and be 
 -^--^ A villain," Hamlet said, but fudg-e! 
 A man may smile and smile, you see 
 Beyond a doubt — and be a judg-e. 
 
 If ear to ear were full a mile, 
 His beard an intervening- forest, 
 
 A thousand trips the judg^e's smile 
 
 Would make between, nor ling-er for rest. 
 
 The robe of Justice was believed 
 To clothe solemnity; and while her 
 
 Vibrating- steelyards knaves relieved, 
 The judg-e should not become a smiler. 
 
A SMILING JUDGE. 27 
 
 So, please the court, we here demur, or 
 
 Reserve exceptions to your smiles; 
 Appealing- from the same as error 
 
 Unwarranted by Coke or Hiles. 
 
 Ivike sapient Ulpian be demure 
 
 "Whose litig-ant all dupes surpasses; 
 
 Be doubtful, cautious, g-rave as your 
 Environment of solemn asses. 
 
28 
 
 TO FATHER. 
 
 /^~^OMKS May 'tis four and eig-hty years 
 
 The truant world has wandered 
 Among- the outer circling spheres 
 Since first you, father, pondered 
 O'er life's realities; 
 And nearly forty-three of these 
 
 Since I amazed first sat 
 Upon your proudly dancing- knees 
 Both, doubtless, wondering- at 
 Life's possibilities. 
 
TO FATHER. 29 
 
 Dare we g"0 jaunting- back tog^ether 
 
 Without apparent fear 
 Throug-h vanished calm and stormy weather 
 
 Kvading sig-h or tear 
 In memories? 
 How much of g-rief was sunflushed dew I 
 
 The same eventful story 
 Upon the lang-uid tong-ue; and, too, 
 
 The same abundant g-lory 
 Our hearts to please. 
 
 Your eyes turn toward the western sun 
 
 Expecting- it to set. 
 Life's varied mission nearly done — 
 
 Not yet — g-aze here, not yet! 
 Ivct us remember. 
 There is some urg-ent need of staying- 
 
 Tog-ether long-er, thoug-h 
 My crescent life is in the Maying- 
 
 And yours about the snow 
 Of chill December. 
 
30 TO FATHER. 
 
 Save you alone I never owned 
 
 One whom I dared call friend; 
 For such a lack have you atoned, 
 Mine fully to the end; 
 
 So ends the grieving-. 
 How kind th2 world has been, withal, in 
 
 So many things to both! 
 Such g-ood and ill have us befallen — 
 I am (are you not?) loth 
 To g"ive up living. 
 
 Good turns and bad have been bestowed 
 
 Upon me unretarded, 
 And neither debt has long been owed, 
 
 The losses disregarded. 
 
 As well the gains. 
 
 Unworthy son am I to be 
 
 Owned by a sire so clever: 
 You never had an enemy, 
 
 While friends are bound forever 
 In golden chains. 
 
TO FATHER. 3 1 
 
 An enemy you never had 
 
 Except one pseudo-friend; 
 As I remember you were mad 
 Predicting- his sad end: 
 
 "G-ollmima dang" you! 
 If you will not my words attend — 
 
 (Wait till I cut this switch) 
 And your confounded conduct mend, 
 The tree is g-rowing- which 
 
 Will sometime hang- you." 
 
 I^et us tog-ether smile away 
 
 Those teapot tempests now, 
 Both praying- that I ever may 
 
 Escape the strang-ling- boug-h 
 For me by rig-hts. 
 The picture's darkest backg-round this 
 
 Which by no hocus pocus 
 Will dim the view that brig-hter is, 
 
 I standing- in the focus — 
 Turn on red lights! 
 
32 TO FATHER. 
 
 But, father, dear, too long- the cruise 
 
 To traverse rushing- years, 
 Or wake fond memories with reviews 
 
 (Nor would they stifle tears) 
 Des'-jned for laughter. 
 Most happ3" years reserved in store 
 
 Be 3^ours still to enjoy, ' 
 Forgetting not that evermore 
 
 I'll be your old-time boy 
 
 Till both hearts stop and after. 
 
QIR BUTTE^RFlvY, Your radiant colors flash 
 
 Goldfoiled in thousand hues their shield-like 
 guards 
 Defying- me to question 3^our trick wards 
 Of sunra3' fencing. I will bravely smash 
 Your froward person into dubious hash. 
 Reserve such fate to arrogance awards. 
 Peace is your mission? Sol Exchange regards. 
 My choler was too sudden, always ra-sh. 
 In peace or war I would a lesson learn: 
 
 Your gaudy tints bespeak the amorous knave, 
 Some gay IvOth»rio on passions bent 
 Subduing lepidopteral hearts; you yearn 
 For sensual plunder? Liasons j^ou have, 
 
 Confess them — GonsI Will ever rogues repent? 
 
34 
 
 I.INKS TO EI.DER B. ' 
 
 T THINK the World desig-ned as round, 
 
 Is nearly so as orbs are found; 
 And that a ninny may propound 
 
 A deal of cavil 
 Which Solomon, howe'er profound, 
 
 Could not unravel. 
 
 You teach that hell is hissing- hot, 
 A torrid climate heaven has not, 
 And purgatory mean, I wot, 
 
 For lying 'twixt them, 
 A temperature by sinners sought 
 
 As prelates mixed them. 
 
lylNKS TO KIvDKR B, 35 
 
 You say that in the future life 
 
 Man will his own from, neighbor's wife 
 
 Not know much better than this strife 
 
 Intensely human, 
 Where he may lip, as common fife, 
 
 The varied woman. 
 
 I would be certain; nay, a doubt 
 Will life's hereafter sadly rout; 
 A playhouse !Sion make without 
 
 Grounds more specific; 
 For here the churches fight — and shout 
 
 "I^et 's be pacific," 
 
 Men are as honest as they may: 
 lyie, swindle, pilfer, cuckold, slay, 
 Seduce, confound, rob, slander, pray, 
 
 Malig-n and bicker; 
 If all these roads lead upward, they 
 Gain scaffolds quicker. 
 
36 I.INES TO KI.UEK K, 
 
 The world is g-rowing- better; yet. 
 
 The pauper, tramp and starved are met 
 B^^ sleek philanthrophy whose fret 
 
 Is — "Will the press of it 
 
 Catch wind, m}^ name sonorous g-et, 
 
 Or make a mess of it?" 
 
 With earth you are not satisfied, 
 Nor earthlj" methods, mixed and pied 
 So pilg-rims cannot throug^h them glide 
 
 In even course; 
 Were all corrections left 5^0 u, I'd 
 
 Find matters worse. 
 
 With heaven I am not content 
 If what the churches say is in 't; 
 I^et those who will their sins repent, 
 
 Despite small laughter, 
 A chance the gambler would not stint 
 
 To win hereafter. 
 
TJNKS To EL^iK^R B. ,'^7 
 
 As far as hell goes I admit 
 There is excuse for building- it> 
 The earth holds many for it lit 
 
 Whose hearts now freeze. 
 Their names? if you insist, to-wit: — 
 
 Our enemies. 
 
 Thus, Elder, in these lines make out 
 What I believe, or wherein doubt;: 
 You will discover me about 
 
 As bad as lawful; 
 I'm with you, Elder, if you shout — 
 
 O awful, awful.' 
 
 If you, however, deem my verse 
 Deserving- ag-g-rayated curse, 
 Hurl your anathema, or worse, 
 
 In words to suit you. 
 We must the same course take ahearse 
 
 But there I quit you. 
 
3S 
 
 CENTENNIAI. HOPKB. 
 
 T HOPE that in the treasury of Time 
 
 A g-olden fortune coined by Truth awaits 
 The full maturity and goodly prime 
 Of this young- family of States 
 So they may richly ag-e, 
 Grow wise and sag'e* 
 
 I hope that thoug-h all things must die in years, 
 
 This childhood of our States is aug"ury 
 Of coming greatness free of guilt and tears; 
 That growth to fullest worth Will see 
 This maiden truth increase^ 
 In States is peace. 
 
CKNTENNIAlv HOPES. 39 
 
 I hope these States will never more ag-airi 
 
 Ivike crocodiles make meals of dearest blood 
 On their own children; naug-ht to wash the stain, 
 Not g-rief with rivers at the flood — 
 Deeds may, good deeds to those 
 Who live dead foes. 
 
 I hope the chime of freedom from the tower 
 
 Of Philadelphia will harmony 
 To strug-g-ling- nations ring-, no slaves, no power; 
 For thoug-htful people must be free; 
 No dispensation gave 
 Heaven to enslave. 
 
 Four ceiituries has Switzerland progressed; 
 
 Her mythic Tell roams Alpine peaks 
 Unchained as mountain winds; she stands the test. 
 And yet, our boastful Union speaks 
 As if, though but beg-un, 
 The race were run. 
 
40 CKNTKNNIAIv HOPKv'>. 
 
 States g-row with men, men grow with new ideas 
 
 And these are sane and insane in us all; 
 May anarchy's allies^, craze-varied, be as 
 Confined as madmen in the wall 
 Of speechles-s, coward skulls 
 A-way from fools. 
 
 I hope disputes will never weapon draw, 
 
 For one poor life outweig^hs the honor g-ained- 
 At pride's most senseless war: abide the law 
 In which, not blood, be heroes trained: 
 Then will these States long: be: 
 Completely frecv 
 
 4 July 1876. 
 
4t 
 
 ^SOP^S HARfi. 
 
 A TIMID hare (and why creation took 
 
 Such care to implicate so coy a creature 
 With such a startling-, nervous heart 's a feature 
 Of hig-her plans unsolved) ran by a brook. 
 
 Again this hare (because alorlg' its tr'ack 
 
 The frogs leaped from their grassy qua'ters 
 tJpon the margin ihto glassy waters 
 
 in uttef, abject fear) ran sriorting backs 
 
 Thus back arid forth (rior rieed one this affair 
 Prolong to guess the tinlid creature hovered 
 Alorig the barik because fear was discovered 
 
 tn frogs) arid to arid fro r'ari raniparit hare. 
 
42 ^SOP'S HAR^, 
 
 How much like man! (because 'tis his penchant 
 To run a blazef on each timid victim 
 Who winces at his booh! it would convict him 
 
 Of cowardice.) How very much like man! 
 
 Some men are hares (w'hen they amid the 
 
 Flee hounds in fear; or, bravely on the border 
 Of brooks flush startled frog-s in wild disorder 
 
 And plung^ing- fear.) Some men, alas! are frog's. 
 
 The hare was all surprise— (be not o'erpowered 
 By fear before a stand is made, because 
 A valiant blow may knock out big- applause 
 
 Or flush the frog") to find a g-reater coward, 
 
43 
 SWKET UFE. 
 
 XT^OU SAW that dang-ling- dead leaf dive 
 
 Beneath the grass, the sparrow fall 
 To swell the fig-ures? Once alive, 
 Why dive or fall at all? 
 
 You saw, wind chased, yon blossom leap 
 Into the brook, which, running- on, 
 
 Enlarg-es ocean ever neap — 
 No need to look — 'tis gone! 
 
 O weary counting- 1 g'uess the Sum 
 
 Of sparrows fall'n, and hopes as welll 
 
 Arithmetic is g-rossly dumb, 
 No finite fig-ures tell. 
 
 O transient, brooding-, dreaming- man! 
 
 Death is the certain thing- he knows- 
 Ivife is the puzzle, sweeter than 
 
 Rich frag-rarice of the rosie, 
 
44 
 
 BUB 'ROBA 
 
 fP CRESSID will toy with a loiig-iiig- to pl&.y 
 with lis, 
 Pondlitlg- to kiss arid foi' favors disclose 
 Her eriamoririg- charms that, itl truth, g'et away 
 
 With US, 
 Frownirig, caressing, by yea arid by riay with Us, 
 i^et her ruderiess or riuderiess impassioriirig stay 
 with us 
 
 tlrider thf^ i'ose. 
 
SUB ROSA. 45 
 
 Rebuke the uiichivalrous rog-ue who will tell to us 
 Honors once plucked from .the darling-s he knows; 
 Such a brag-g-art of secrets exposes a hell to us 
 Here in a paradise Satan would sell to us, — 
 For belike the like liasons frequently fell to us 
 Under the rose 
 
 Let triumps no matter what form they may hie 
 with us, 
 Conquering- passions, companions or foes, 
 Be estopped from proclaiming- the prowess to die 
 
 with us 
 Coaxing- or hoaxing-, — known others may vie with us. 
 Such frivolities should for eternity lie with us 
 Under the rose. 
 
46 
 
 TRAITORS. 
 
 ''T^HAT CHKliK whose permeating flush 
 Darts lig-hting o'er the pallid face 
 Till one may trace 
 By dint of that quick blush 
 The poorly smothered thought, 
 
 Is traitor. ' 
 
 That tongue whose wily rambling o'er 
 The narrow path of truth, trips down 
 A checking frown, 
 Is, to the ruling power 
 Of love, hate, joy or woe 
 A traitor. 
 
TRAITORS. 47 
 
 That eye whose bickering- g-lances stray 
 Into the far-off trembling skies 
 To catechise, 
 Is, hj its timd ray, 
 
 Unto the muffled speech 
 A traitor. 
 
 That man who slides within the groove 
 Cut by blind moralists of old, 
 
 Whose fell heirs scold 
 "When thoug-ht and earth still move, 
 Is to God's ordained law, 
 A traitor. 
 
4^^ 
 
 VENUS SANS ADONIS. 
 
 ^TTlTH VENUS poets have indulg-ed the fancy 
 In liberal moods to coach the sig-hing- race; 
 lyicentious amorists they are, all can see, 
 Who flirt with sacred, or profane the base, 
 Desires of hearts; 
 And all the arts 
 Of pen or chisel in outlining Venus, 
 
 The peerless beauty of the ages 
 Recorded in authentic pages, 
 Are but the croppings of the craze within us. 
 
 No matter whom their frenzies may applaud, till 
 For utmost love she poses as the model. 
 
VENUS SANS ADONIS 49 
 
 My chosen Venus burning at my heart 
 
 Of sacred flames of ultra love (because it 
 Is secret from the gossip's prying art 
 Which makes incarnate skeletons acloset) 
 Will be the burden 
 Of every word in 
 These licensed rhymes that strangly zigzag- turn. 
 "Beauty is truth, truth beauty" 
 Sang Keats, an urn to view 't; he 
 No sweeter ashes from his Grecian urn 
 Scattered upon his over-fertiled poesy: 
 Why Beauty's goddess left to her repose he? 
 
 Hers is a form subverting ^hoh^ writ 
 
 Whose legend of the story of creation 
 Reverts to dust for origin unfit; 
 
 Such form compiled (despite asseveration 
 Before the flood) 
 Before the blood 
 With spirit coursed thro' rivers of her mold. 
 Dust had not been, musty 
 And classic Venus de 
 Medici, seafoam or in marble cold, 
 
 Beside her stands a yellow wreck in view, 'tis 
 A mass of maitnad and tiuislv broken beauties. 
 
50 VKNUS SANS ADONIS. 
 
 Red roses have been ravished for their tropes 
 
 To parallel the lips of painted woman; 
 That they will yield to her, I have hig-h hopes, 
 A color warmer than was ever human. 
 A red red red. 
 Twice hued, thrice said 
 To equal the vermillion of her lips — 
 
 And after could I speak well, 
 Thrice red becomes unequal 
 To her lips' Tyrian roug-e — the red sun dips 
 In ocean such a carnadine if clouds baptizing- 
 Their g-arments can betray a thoug-ht worth prizing-. 
 
 Her eyes! O commonplace of ogling- poets. 
 
 Give way to hers! a blue blue black that g-ives 
 The violet hue. — Two blues niake black, for know it's 
 A law of rhetoric two neg-atives 
 Affirm; so black 
 Of blues — alack! 
 Blue neither, yet not black her tranceful eyes 
 That dream awake, yet waking- 
 Seem as if merely taking- 
 Farewells of sleep. But let them in surprise 
 A query flash, or animated travel in 
 Kxcited ways the g-lance becomes a javelin. - 
 
VENUS SANS ADONIS 5 1 
 
 ^he lily-white complexions in the mortar 
 
 Of happy dreams have been compounded oft', 
 And alabaster brows and all this sort are 
 Supremely cream, superbly white and soft; 
 The seashell pining- 
 For seas defining- 
 A color purer than its lining- hints 
 
 At her full-bleached enamel — 
 Tho' this will truly trammel 
 The metaphor of pearly-creamy tints 
 
 Of her pink-white complexion — blooded petal 
 Of bleaching- rose sug-g-ests it, but not yet all. 
 
 Her bosom is a labyrinth of love 
 
 Beyond the clue revealed by Ariadne; 
 Wise Solomon whose hillside sheep once strove 
 To bosom woman, harped a song- to sadden; he 
 . Orig-inal 
 Was, that is all. 
 There is no tang-ible equation g-iven 
 
 To fig-ure her attractive piir — 
 Warm, full, protruding, round, and, fair 
 As winnowed snow, or what some call snow driven, 
 Whatever that is, — but I find it stands a 
 Necessity to write another stanza 
 
52 VKNUS SANS ADONIS. 
 
 To shift the flimsy veil of rhyme aside 
 The coyest bosom to reveal here free 
 Of shielding- drapery before denied 
 
 Its function of concealment. Say that the 
 Imprisoned breast 
 Is in a chest, — 
 A treasure box of wonders, cautioned to 
 
 Keep closed lest som^e Pandora open 
 The lids that close my hope in 
 ('Tis said from hers all other blessings flew 
 Tho' by the g-ods bequeathed) for fear 
 Of dissipation to thin atmosphere. 
 
 If sounds were mellowed to the charming* lyre 
 
 Manipulated by rare Orpheus, 
 With sea-beach chorus and a floral choir 
 - All distanced to an echo for the use 
 Of ravished ears, 
 So one who hears 
 Enjoys a sense of perfume and of sound, 
 They would securely mirror 
 Her voice to nature nearer 
 Than sounding- speech in verbal artist found; 
 
 So sweet it is, so charming- in the total 
 Of slides, breaks, emphasis — no need to note all. 
 
VENUS SANS ADONIS. 53 
 
 Now there you have her — pardon, I have, rather, 
 
 With wealth of love more ample than what fell in 
 The path of Paris who Troy of his father 
 Inflamed with firebrand of epic Helen. 
 Her heart I live in 
 Responsive g-iven 
 In ways beyond the tell-tale pen; so full can 
 No worded meter measure 
 The ardent love we treasure 
 Since Mars took measurment of Mrs. Valcan: 
 Unlike the blacksmith's fate with love of Venus, 
 No Mars can mar the marvelous love between us. 
 
54 
 
 HONESTY NON EST. 
 
 "An honest man 's the noblest work of God,'* 
 In christian fervor said the poet Pope; 
 Bob Ing-ersoll, the atheist, sans hope. 
 
 Seduced the words to make the line a bawd. 
 
 "An honest g-od 's the noblest work of man," 
 Inversely runs the orator's late version; 
 And while the meaning" suffers mean perversion, 
 
 The line in equal measure poets scan. 
 
 A caviling- wag- who in grim humor revels 
 Announces an amendment scarcely honest. 
 Whose new construction of the adjunct 's f^on est, 
 
 Or god or man, hence both the work of devils. 
 
HONESTY NON EST. 55 
 
 Well, who is rig-ht? Man's death, if one believes 
 The serpent story, is assigned to Satan; 
 And Moses says that God did man create, an 
 
 Ung-rateful creature who strange gods conceives. 
 
 The quest is idle backward though we go: 
 
 The sun-scorned taper of Diogenes 
 
 Whose search-light efforts made frauds ill at ease, 
 Could never honest man in Athens show. 
 
 Reverting to the "honest" qualifier: 
 As well abide the coming light when we all 
 Within the baleful glare of crackling sheol, 
 
 May find an honest being by its fire. 
 
56 
 
 A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 
 
 T^OR 3^ou, my Nellie, were you older g-rowrl 
 
 To understand the wild words issuing- 
 r^rom lines like these, I should the g-ods invoke 
 With prayer and worded incense that they would 
 On you a fond parental g-ift bestow. 
 Upon my knee you asked some Yuletide toy 
 As Christmas present. Wrong* the words. You should 
 Say, rather, "Christmas box" — and, in a week, 
 "A New Year's g^ift, from you." These were the terms 
 Of rarer learning- in the .olden days 
 When spells were wroug^ht in Latin, fairies called 
 
A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 57 
 
 In classic incantation, devils banned 
 
 And banished bj- learned formulas of speech. 
 
 You shall be happy with a Christmas box: 
 
 Its value measure not with sting-y rules 
 
 Of earth whose survey in full amplitude 
 
 Of reach our kindred measures out of hom^s — - 
 
 Surveying- pallid poverty untouched 
 
 While prodig-al with diamonds, g-auze and paint 
 
 Wealth stares meek Charity out of the way. 
 
 What will it be the promised Christmas box? 
 
 Dear daug-hter, were papa's delayed ship fraug-ht 
 
 With g-olden dreams more opulent than tales 
 
 Embellished with Arabian device 
 
 When brains and lamps were scraped for palaces 
 
 Or g-imcrack fortunes, he should name a g-ift 
 
 To beg-g-ar princesses and drive ag-ain 
 
 The lavish Arab to his splendid dreams. 
 
 Now shall I tell you of Pandora's box? 
 
 Pandora was the maiden first on earth, 
 
 She was of g-ods the all-endowed; they g^ave 
 
 Her every blessing- benefitting- man. 
 
58 A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 
 
 Within a box were closed the futite gifts; 
 
 While thus enclosed secure was happiness 
 
 To humankind. How deep the symbol here! 
 
 Our chiefest happiness is still concealed — 
 
 Our greatest good unknown. This is the Greek 
 
 Conception of the origin of ill. — ■ 
 
 The Hebrew fable with its woman too 
 
 At apples straining, spying mysteries, 
 
 You may hereafter learn and how Kve's fruit 
 
 "Brought death into the world and all our woe. 
 
 The dear Pandora curious to know 
 
 The form of human happiness concealed 
 
 Within the box, against the edict giv'n, 
 
 Despite ukase of mighty Czars of high 
 
 Olytnpus, peeped into the box, alas! 
 
 And, though the lid was parted from the trunk 
 
 Not wider than your two sweet lips now part, 
 
 Out flew to heaven human happiness, 
 
 Out flew each gift of special providence, 
 
 !^ach heavenly token for earth's splendor given 
 
 By good designing gods who minister 
 
A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 59 
 
 To Jove since then nor after spared a boon 
 To curious mankind. Thus dowered she 
 Essayed a peep, nay, half a peep at g-ifts 
 Whose wing's fanned air about Elysium 
 Before imprisonment; Pandora ope'd 
 The lid and out flew winged Charity, 
 Contentment, Wisdom, Friendship, Justice, Eove, 
 Faith, Beauty, Purity, Joy, Ivoyalty, 
 Benevolence, Truth, Virtue, Wit and all — 
 Ay, every wing was whipping air to gain 
 The heavens never to return. The girl 
 Enthralled by wonderment inactive stood. 
 And spellbound by the blessings fled — the guests 
 Whose parting- was unspeeded by their host. 
 Aroused at leng-th rushed blindly to the box, 
 In panting- haste closed down the luckless lid, 
 And, fortunately too, closed Hope within, 
 Hope slowest gift to beat its rainbow wing-s, 
 Hope longest here to tarry, Hope the last 
 Our dreams to quit, our bosoms to forsake, 
 For Hope was in the bottom of the box. 
 
6o A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 
 
 Pine not for vanished joys: the present bliss, 
 
 The hope retained, the pleasure held, the cheer 
 
 We now enjoy would suffer in exchange. 
 
 When years wing back to you their varied gifts 
 
 Of doubtful pleasures with their pains unseen, 
 
 Yon will have learned what poets say of Hope: 
 
 With gewgaw metaphors they dress her up, 
 
 Trope spangle her from ankle unto neck, 
 
 And robe her in hyperbole. Withal, 
 
 Her fascinating form unmillinered 
 
 By poesy to us comes best in rags. 
 
 Hope radiant with colors bends her bow 
 
 To arch the clouded future. Half my life 
 
 Is gone were Hope to write the figures, yet 
 
 Hope is enchantress gilding time to come 
 
 With hues entrancing that if I were you — - 
 
 Or once again redated at your age, 
 
 A child of three, to tread the zigzag path 
 
 Of life once more — I should abandon Hope. 
 
 Who to the cradle would retrace his steps 
 
 By guiding Memory when Hope points on. 
 
A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 6 1 
 
 The pilgrim well assured there lies the grave 
 
 To-morrow or to-morrow or to-morrow? 
 
 Had not Pandora saved for us this Hope 
 
 Death would be the religion of the world 
 
 And Suicide its priestess. But no more 
 
 Of matter not pertaining to my gift. 
 
 Suppose to me the power were assigned 
 
 Of all the troops of vanished gifts to call 
 
 One back for you, which blessing would it be? 
 
 Who will approve my choice? Not "Wisdom say 
 
 Benevolence is chosen, neither Wit 
 
 Nor Ivove if favor is allied to Truth, 
 
 Nor Virtue passing Virtue by; each gift 
 
 Rejected in the choice will jealous pout 
 
 And all arrayed for peevish commentary 
 
 Be critical as if a human heart 
 
 Supplied keen tongues with envy. Make a choice 
 
 Of Beauty e'en would I, for Beauty is 
 
 The sovereign ruler of the pulsing world; 
 
 The gift were Beauty could my choice prevail. 
 
 And what is Beautv? Abstract definition 
 
62 A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 
 
 Impoverishes the lexicon for words 
 
 To mean as much as Beauty's fing-er means. 
 
 A slig-hted youth revolving- in his brain 
 
 Her outlines, vanishing- in uttered breath 
 
 When speech defined, g-ave her this character: 
 
 "Beauty is truth, truth beauty; that is all 
 
 Ye know on earth and all ye need to know." 
 
 Mere object lessons worldly heroes are 
 
 In vassalag-e of Beauty. They to touch 
 
 Her garment's hem have pawned imperial sway, 
 
 And tumbled king-doms to be Beauty's slave; 
 
 For her a thousand Antonies have lost 
 
 Their thousand empires; and on her behalf 
 
 The sword carved history on marble piles, 
 
 The lyre was strung- to tremble softer notes. 
 
 The pen in inspiration was immersed, 
 
 And for her smile hypnotic love was doomed. 
 
 A dowery of beauty would enslave 
 
 All hearts from peasant up to courtly king-, 
 
 She is imperious, tyrannical. 
 
 The arrant wit, the social gay, the sage 
 
A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 63 
 
 Of cooler temper will eng-ag-e their lives 
 
 In kindly act or homag-e meekly shown. 
 
 With beauty's g-ift you at your feet may look 
 
 On passionate and favor-craving- love; 
 
 On wisdom clamoring- for bonds of chains; 
 
 On wealth expostulating- to be cast 
 
 With lavish hand where pleasure dare invite; 
 
 On statesmen subtle in deep policies 
 
 To win your approbation; on divines 
 
 Imploring from the dust ag-ain to, be 
 
 Created in some form of worshipers; 
 
 On artists, scholars, warriors at your feet 
 
 impleading- recog-nition of their worth, 
 
 Acceptance of their tribute to your shrine. 
 
 This christmastide your g-ift from one whose love 
 
 Of you must hold unrivaled, would be such 
 
 A beauty shed upon you as must needs 
 
 Inspire the universe for bolder scheme 
 
 Of fresh invention, that the rose be dyed 
 
 Anew, the lily painted, and a spray 
 
 Of perfume cast upon the violet 
 
64 A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 
 
 To intimate how much these beauties lack 
 For faint comparison. 
 
 Your box would hold 
 The gift of Beauty flown were I empowered 
 To call the prisoner back; I happj^ too, 
 So you were fairer than this winter moon 
 Pacing- the promenade of ultra blue 
 Among her twinkling votaries of stars. 
 
 ■;<- * * * * -sf- * 
 
 O Time, among your varied gifts to her, 
 
 Be liberal with sweets, be liberal 
 
 With thy abundant store of happy toys — 
 
 For easily are human beings pleased; 
 
 And if my child be asked to fathom grief. 
 
 To pulse the blood of anguish — rather let 
 
 The father swing her now, so pure, so chaste, 
 
 Into thy phantom arms in dim abyss 
 
 That he may contemplate her little life 
 
 There struggle to the doubtful dream of wings. 
 
65 
 
 lyyARCISSUS flees his Kcho, thereby dies 
 Her love and beatity to ethereal sound; 
 So doomed by Juno when her lord was found , 
 Employing this deceiver with her trickeries. 
 Till spoken to fond Echo ne'er rejalies 
 But ling-ers tnute, in silence firnilj^ bound: 
 How doomed like woman's love I Till men pro- 
 pound 
 The sighing- query she no echo sighs; 
 If boisterous, answered boisterously; or low, 
 Replying low; that harsh, then harsh is this; 
 What mood Narcissus in strange tones employ's 
 His shadowed Echo's full responses show; 
 Ivove, equal love; hate, hate, and kiss for kiss; 
 Yet, men their echoes spurn, themselves the 
 cause! 
 
66 
 
 M. KSTEIvLH G. 
 
 I^XTHAT love has broug-ht you I may never know, 
 
 Nor to your lips whose lips must ling-er long- — 
 lyips that were mine and dearly long ag^o 
 
 By their confession kisses warm among-. 
 If I could pray the orison would show 
 
 My deep contrition: I was in the wrong-; 
 And pray your heart in love has won the ease 
 That mine accomplishes it* miseries. 
 
 And, Stella, somewhere sometime you may read 
 
 This laggfard exposition of a heart 
 Whose love has gone astray: my eyes had need 
 
 Of your interpretation of a part 
 Of one small word — what trifles trifles feed! 
 
 One extra flourish in the penman's art 
 Made me discern the jealous word, another, 
 When YOU had written tenderly of "mother." 
 
M. KSTKI.I.E G. 67 
 
 "The setting- of a great hope" (with the ring- 
 Returned, these quoted words alone returned) 
 
 "Is like the setting- of the sun," now bring- 
 Reg-ret, remorse by hasty conduct earned. 
 
 Be yours the sweets of love, mine all the sting-; 
 Yours peace, mine pain; j^ours happiness, mine 
 learn'd 
 
 In woe profound be made to realize 
 
 That love so loth to blunder never dies. 
 
68 
 
 ON A PAINTING. 
 
 IVTOTE^ j^onder balcony by love entailed 
 
 Where Romeo departs from Juliet, 
 Her arms enchaining, pursed lips having- failed 
 
 To more than whisper low: "O go not yet, 
 It is not 3'et near day!" The moon impaled 
 
 Upon the ivied tower deigns to set 
 Lfike Romeo but lingers. I am sorry very 
 The lark and not the nightingale sang tirra-lirra. 
 
 There 3'ou behold two rival geniuses 
 In their endeavor to accomplish art, 
 
 The poet and the painter; nothing less 
 Than marvelous both empires over heart 
 
 Controlled by supplemental memories. 
 
 Constrained are all t' espouse the poet's part, 
 
 Transcendent in domain, for most would fail 
 
 These colored spells to feel were there no tragic tale 
 
ON A PAINTING. 69 
 
 Bee hov/ the painted wind toys with the stairs 
 Of silken ropes down which the poet takes 
 
 The fervid Romeo to fortune's snares: 
 
 A nig-htcap frilled is all the painter makes 
 
 To prophesy the nurse's puffing cares; 
 
 You know she calls — hist! now the door she shakes: 
 
 The Copulets are up, the russet morn 
 
 Is robed, the nig-hting-ale forsakes the thorn! 
 
 This miracle of love the painter's brush 
 Has fastened there in spellbound witchery, 
 
 When death, destruction authorize a rush. 
 Go, Romeo, in silence; drown the sig-h 
 
 Your kisses echo. — Juliet, girl, hush! 
 
 L/Ct waving hand announce the sad goodby. 
 
 My oh! what raptures do these artists throw 
 
 About poor Juliet and her Romeo! 
 
70 
 
 GUINKVKRK'S LAMENT. 
 
 O, 
 
 WKARY as the pale tiiorn-star 
 That wanders from the threshold of the 
 tiig-ht, 
 I'm ling-ering afar" 
 Where heartmates corrie not nor 
 The trusted lips that are 
 T'he lover's fond delig-ht! 
 How weary, weary., weary! 
 
 To live, or, die and rest, 
 
 which were best! 
 
 More maudlin than the sea-made moart 
 iPhat pines for Timon by the Attic wave 
 Is life's abandoned tone; 
 
 1 in the world alone 
 Bnlist no friend, have none 
 
 To cherish me or save! 
 Too weary, weary, weary! 
 
 If living- be the best 
 Where, where is rest? 
 
GUINEVERE S EAMENT. 
 
 How wear3/ are the hours, ah me I 
 Yet have I trusted — patientlj' I'll trust 
 The lover\s coming-, he 
 A wooer still must be — ■- ■ 
 I yielding- too, till we 
 Lfie dead both in the dust: 
 Still weary, wear}^ weary! 
 
 If dying- were the best 
 Death g-ives not rest. 
 
 O mocking- man, O scoffing dame! 
 Claim all the virtue that the saints have not; 
 Your hearts are passing- tame 
 Not stirring- at the name — 
 Love's g"lory and love's shame — 
 Of Lancelot, my Lancelot. 
 I^m weary, weary, wearj^ 
 
 Of love denied its rest 
 Upon this lover's breast. 
 
72 GUINKVERK S IvAMENT. 
 
 The shamed moon hides behind the sea, 
 And guilty stars in depths of azure languish 
 As shunning weary me 
 Whose heart was never free 
 Of love or misery, 
 Of pain or cruel anguish; 
 Still jealous and aweary— 
 
 Dost think Klaine hath sought 
 Again my lyancelot? 
 
 That smile, that cunning, knowing smile 
 Betrays his treachery. — I'll burst these Walls 
 Of masonry and while 
 Their beads nuns tremble I'll 
 Tear-drown this granite pile 
 Till it a ruin falls. 
 Prayer-wearj^ and heart-weary 
 
 Confined king-doomed I'll not 
 Abide from I^ancelot! 
 
CxU INK VERB S tAMENT. 73 
 
 Ho, there, unbar! — No answer bring" 
 My panic words. — Unbar! what, ho! without! 
 Who comes? not Arthur, King-? 
 Pass on, pass up; nay, wing 
 Your higher way, nor cling- 
 To subtle, earthly doubt — 
 I'm guilty and aweary 
 
 Of king-love — in love's tilt he 
 Won Guinevere, the guilty. 
 
 Resounding walls, not Arthur, hear 
 My mad confession. lyct them crack for sham^ 
 Or shrive me for the sphere 
 Of woe, or penance drear 
 Impose on Guinevere 
 To clear her slandered nam^e 
 Who is aweary, weary 
 
 Of earth, air, night, nun, riov'ice 
 Not being where her love is. 
 
74 GUINKVERE vS tAMENT. 
 
 Coy moon, flirt with the sea; 
 And, quizzing stars, abide the coming- light 
 When fuller, ampler equity 
 Adjusts the passions we 
 Endure with frailty: 
 Love's errors are love's right; 
 And I am weary, weary 
 
 For earth the heart to take 
 It only made to break. 
 
 Comes harp, We two may pine alotie^ 
 Nay, softer, softer — trillaby, how sad! 
 
 Trill, thrill, O dead the tone, 
 
 "Moan, moan," it murmurs, "moan' 
 
 Ha! that a lover's groan 
 
 Is to my bosom known, 
 And my brain all but mad, 
 So weary, weary, weary: 
 
 To love in life's unrest 
 
 May be the best, — 
 
 It is the best. 
 
75 
 
 STAR OF THH EAST. 
 
 OTARS of the Nig-ht, give answer! You 
 
 Have lost the pagan sister of the Seven, 
 One Pleiad gone beyond the view, 
 
 Or buried in the stellar dust of heaven 
 Ke'er to return, 
 Whence pagans mourn, 
 But answer, wheil your flame is low 
 Will new light from the ashes glow? 
 
 Star of our faith, of Bethlehem, 
 
 Of Christ, the jewel of the eastern hlvie, 
 Bright for a night but after dim 
 In oriental waste to mortal view, 
 What is yottr sky 
 But immortality; 
 Your nlenl'ry but the light set iil 
 Hope's window for the feet of sin? 
 
76 STAR 01^ THE KAST. 
 
 Two stars are gone; yet, in the g-low 
 
 Of sinking-, sunset years, Faith sits believing, 
 Ay, knowing- — Faith presumes to know — 
 That Christ's eternal star still undeceiving* 
 Will shine ag-ain, 
 / Forever reig-n 
 
 For wisemen. Fool, O fool-shut eyes! 
 "Wayfarers seeing- will be wise. 
 
 Star of the East, shine on forever; 
 
 Tho' empires westward move and build below 
 The pillars of Atlantis, never 
 Beyone the lig-ht of thee they g-o 
 To joy, despond 
 Never beyond. 
 Thy occult beams the mind will light 
 When death adjusts the shades of nig-ht. 
 
77 
 DYEING THE ROSE. 
 
 A SCAI^APUS who charg-ed queen Proserpine 
 
 With eating- seeds of the pomegranate, was, 
 Tho' true the alleg^ation 'g-ainst hell's queen, 
 Turned to an owl for tattling- 'g-ainst the laws. 
 
 Nor yet has he forgotten this fell trait, 
 
 This meddling owl and mocker of the moon; 
 
 He ruffed his tufts this night, I must relate, 
 Silence or sound to hoot, this nig-ht in June. 
 
 The nighting-ale on rosy favorites 
 
 'Gan chanting- forth this amatory lay 
 
 Just as the moon relit her silver lights 
 Behind the argent shadows of the day: 
 
 "Sweet Philomel, awake 
 
 And list to me; 
 A carol thro' the vale 
 To cheer the moonbeams pale 
 
 May rouse the spellbound brake 
 To hear my praise of thee. 
 
78 DYEING THE ROSE 
 
 "My love earth must not hear, 
 My tears none view; 
 
 Philomel, my Philomel, 
 
 lyist to the throbbing- tale I tell. 
 Forever trust me, dear, 
 
 1 g-ive my heart" — "To hoo?" 
 
 This inquiry the wan owl thundered out 
 In accents void of music; and the vale 
 
 Reverberated it, called echoes shout 
 
 The accents harsh to silence down the dale. 
 
 And silence which is sexton of all sound 
 
 Returned from its g-rim mission where it laid 
 
 The owl's To-hoo to rest beneath the ground; 
 Thus, peace assured, the nig-hting-ale essayed:- 
 
 "O Philomela, though 
 
 .The mocker knew 
 To whom my heart I gave. 
 For whom I pine or rave, 
 
 I'd have the blind world know 
 
DYKING THE ROSE. 79 
 
 I g-ave my heart" — "To hool 
 False knave, to hoo?" 
 
 The imgrammatic owl by g-ods decreed 
 
 A speechifier most inopportune, 
 Alarmed the songster who showed Pan the reed, 
 
 That down the songster fell in pallid swoon. 
 
 But sound less arg-ument or log-ic wise, 
 
 Was evermore perplexing". Sag^es spent 
 Much breath in sound, so did this bird in sig-hs 
 Proclaiming- his last will and testament: 
 "I dye this rosebud red. 
 
 My love, for thee; 
 Its thorn let out life's flood 
 And forth drips pulsing- blood 
 
 To dye the pale rose red 
 For love, my love for thee." 
 His Philomela listening- sad beside 
 
 In unschooled treble blubbered from her bower 
 Of roses this sad requiem — she tried 
 
 To sing in tears, not angels have the power: 
 
8o DYEING THE ROSE 
 
 O bitter, woeful sig-ht 
 
 For love to see! 
 Thro' all the weary years 
 Shall fall my widowed tears 
 
 Till they the rose wash white 
 For thee, my love" — "Te hee!" 
 
 The owl grew merry quite, 
 "Te hee, fond fool, tee hee!" 
 
 White rose of truth, and love's red rose still bloom 
 Despite the owl-cried slander all in vain; 
 
 lyove dyed the one, and Truth's sweethearted boon 
 Of tears was shed to wash it white agfain.- 
 
 Thus in the Persian vale lyove testified 
 In dumb sig^nificants what after were 
 
 For hatred in the Temple Garden vied — 
 The rose of York, the rose of I^ancaster. 
 
8i 
 
 IVTOT many years ag"o these swamps betrayed 
 Unwary travelers by their phantom light, 
 The ig-nis fatuus weak hearts to fright, 
 When pioneers within its precincts strayed. 
 Here in substantial edifice arrayed 
 This marvel to the all bewildered sight, 
 The gourd developed in a fairy night, 
 Consummate genius for new commerce made. 
 Hesperian dreams in furnace-flames were welded 
 To beat the orient; the magic wands 
 Swayed by idyllic artifice are felled, it 
 
 The nonpareil White City, greater stands. 
 O'er all the world in reverential awe go, 
 Then ponder on its miniature, Chicago. 
 
•Sz 
 
 JUNE. 
 
 ^TOTJ ma3% perhaps, some slig^ht exception take — 
 
 Plead noisy fowl, or ag-ue's burning- suns, 
 To long- days trivial objection make 
 
 Protesting- to the lang-uor which is June's. 
 
 Come all the months of nature's g-alaxy 
 For crown of honor June, dispel all fear, 
 
 In royal coronation will out-vie, 
 
 Imperial mistress of the crescent year. 
 
 Come all June days in sunlit robes of state, 
 My courtesy the reg-al Twenty-second 
 
 Disting-uishes above its every mate, 
 
 Because in it my natal hour is reckoned. 
 
JUNK. . 83 
 
 It is a day replete with shining hours, 
 
 To darkness leaving- little sway for crime; 
 
 A month of dreams and calm, of love and flowers, 
 The heir apparent of the Summer time. 
 
 L<et biased eye in frenzy elsewhere g-aze 
 
 At seeding- months or fruitful, blizzard free^ 
 
 At placid May, October's mellow haze; 
 My natal month is g"Ood enough for ine. 
 
H 
 
 THE POESY OF A RING. 
 
 /^ IvlTTIvE Rose, my latest cheer, 
 
 My last — plead accidents in bar, 
 To-day your are of ag-e — a year, 
 This tiny ring vouchsafe to wear. 
 
 Your hand; no, no — the left, this fing-er 
 Whose nerve describes the shortest line 
 
 From fing-ertip to heart where ling-er 
 In embryo love-buds of mine. 
 
THtS POESV OI^ A RING. 8$ 
 
 -And how the parent seeds transplants 
 
 In such a tender soil you know 
 -As w^ell as I, but no one w^ants 
 
 To question what the winds may soW" 
 
 "The harvest with the whirlwind comes 
 
 To g-aruer all irt. after years 
 When hearts are ruined, wrecked the homes 
 
 In full propinquity of tears. 
 
 There^ look! "^ou smile, my tender otie, 
 And laug-h* so, that pfesag-es g-ood: 
 
 You recOg-iiize what you have oil, 
 Its mystic, meaning- understood. 
 
 A year of ag'e and compreheiid 
 
 This ring- with endless circle bound? 
 
 X^ike fabled love without an end; 
 Like constancy in fancy found? 
 
S6 TKK POKSY OF A RING, 
 
 This circlet is, or Kepler's count errs, 
 Composed of infinite straight lines, 
 
 Three points of which no line encounters. 
 And thus to turning- ay inclines 
 
 In protests of your fervid heart 
 
 With ring- lore do not love annoint^ 
 
 Lest it inconstant prove the art 
 Of varying- from point to point* 
 
 Ivaug-h and clap hands: Beanporridg-e hot? 
 
 N'o? lost in admirable joy, 
 Our merry g-ame abandoned? what! 
 
 You are enchanted by the toy? 
 
 Wee tendril, twining- Rose of mine, 
 On earth be jeweled first by me 
 
 May this our kindred hearts combine 
 From Adam to eternity! 
 
THE ^OESV OF A RING. 
 
 A fairy fing-er bound in g-old,— 
 
 This cap O is one-half the iiie-asure, 
 
 May million trillions manifold 
 
 Sweet Roses for the world to treasure^ 
 
 As I flow love you loYe youf own, 
 The parents past, the offspring- new; 
 
 What though the cradle be a moan 
 This heart would break for loss of you^ 
 
 And sometime when the lover lips 
 
 This pretty hand for Hymen's potion, 
 
 His fondest vows may mine eclipse 
 But not exceed my heart's devotion. 
 
 So, little one, the ring admire, 
 
 And laug-hing- flash it full to view: 
 
 To all the questions of your sire 
 
 He knows the answer is, "Ah! g-oo!" 
 
§8 
 
 A F^E:ttOW TRAVHI.ER. 
 
 JUST a moment on the bridg-e: 
 'Tis my resting- place the dearest,- 
 Naug-ht to taunt save an odd midg-ej 
 
 Here the village is the clearest 
 Over yonder drooping- ridge, 
 And the queerest. 
 
 Where the brooklet througli the weeds 
 'Tween to files of hills comes humming^ 
 
 Pipe the birds mid winded reeds, 
 liver and forever trummingi 
 
 Much like good times or good deeds, — ■ 
 Evver cotning. 
 
A FEttOW TRAVEtKR 89 
 
 Close's mill continues drinkingf 
 
 This wild brooklet down below; 
 Of the whirling- mill not thinking" 
 
 Rushing- bubbles onward g-o 
 Dashing-, racing-, splashing-, blinking' 
 To and fro. 
 
 Or, the rarest fairy taleiS 
 
 Uttered in the choicest diction 
 By the brooklet to the g-ales 
 
 You remember, and Old Nick's son 
 Who transformed the blabbing- quail's 
 "More wheat" fiction? 
 
 Navy Close cried out, "more Wheat !'^ 
 
 All the customers "more flour!" 
 While the turbine thought it meet 
 
 To demand more water power: 
 To a quail was turned the cheat, 
 Siilgs each hour- 
 
go A FKttOW TRAVEXKR 
 
 Way beyond this ancient mill — 
 
 Sight across these water mallows^ 
 
 Sleeps the village cold and still; 
 'Tis a bourn each being hallows 
 
 Heedless as the brook until 
 All it swallows. 
 
 Ah! my friend, you little know 
 What a journey I have taken 
 
 In this limping fashion slow — 
 E^ighty past, if not mistaken, 
 
 "Eiighty, sir, last June — to go 
 There forsaken. 
 
 You this village kilow, no doubt; 
 
 Rest awhile, I know its people: 
 Mutes of eloquence devout, 
 
 Suffefers no more to weep ill — 
 l)eath would find their chitrch without 
 Marble steeple. 
 
A FELtOW TRAvEI<KR. 9I 
 
 Just beyond the brooklet sleep 
 
 Only friends whom Death would call, he 
 Harkens not to those who weep, 
 
 Nor the splash, skip, dash and sally 
 
 Which the brook makes while its sweep 
 
 Makes the valley. 
 
 Coach me, friend, let me move on. 
 Onward still tho' pace be creeping- — 
 
 Nor has all my vigor gone 
 When there is no charge for keeping 
 
 Any mortal left alone 
 
 Yet not weeping. 
 
 Whither? yonder, well a day! 
 
 Round about but backward neverj 
 O'er this brook lead palsied clay 
 
 To the graveyard where we sever 
 V'/en farewell there I will say, 
 'T is. forever- 
 
92 
 
 PATHOI.0GY 01^ THARS. 
 
 T^ARIy Neal, my son, then midway four and five, 
 '^^^ Observed my awkward surgery afret 
 In once extracting- from my finger — I've 
 Forgotten, thorn or sliver firmly set. 
 
 iHow deep his sympathy! With many "ohs!'* 
 He gazed upon the progress fearing blood; 
 
 And frequent sighs from his pained bosom rose> 
 But never splinter came with ruddy flood. 
 
 His wide brown eyes, a perfect mirror wrought 
 
 Of deep reflection and philosophy, 
 Materialized his thoughts if ever thought 
 
 Wer^ palpable to the espying eye. 
 
TEARS 93 
 
 I lost the thorn in study of his eyes, 
 A tranceful pair; brown as my mother's, than 
 
 My own a deeper shade — his I much prize 
 For this hereditary'- potent plan. 
 
 And viewing- the affair as baffling me 
 
 He undiplomaed doctor as he was, 
 Codes disregarding in his practice, he 
 
 Unskilled in Galen and the statute laws 
 
 Protecting murder in a legal way — 
 
 (For so this quacking flock themselves protect, 
 Whose methods can no commoner gainsay 
 
 Because, forsooth, their parchments so elect; 
 
 Experimenting on the sick to death. 
 In league with sextons, patrons of the g-rave 
 
 Before and after we dispense with breath, 
 A race of ghouls no license law should save; 
 
94 TEARS 
 
 In pill projectiles hurled by colleg^e rules 
 They cannonade us with hot mercury; 
 
 For whims of medicine found training- schools 
 To teach humanity new ways to die) — 
 
 Gave me his remedy oft' tested, oft' 
 
 Exemplified in his experience — 
 (Can learned doctor physic more?) in soft 
 
 And soothing- words fraug-ht with diviner sense. 
 
 Ivet ^sculapius take lessons here 
 
 And all his pupils, thoug-h they amplify 
 
 Kmollient relief sans pain, sans fear, 
 
 None can improve Karl's surg-ery: "Pa, cry." 
 
 These were his words, such his prescription, this 
 The anodyne of pain: "Pa, cry." Tears may 
 
 Be idle as the poet's dream, but his 
 
 Were shed a thousand ailments to allay. 
 
TEARS. 95 
 
 Tears were his case of instruments to cut 
 The rooted splinter, tears the antidote 
 
 Of every ill inflicting- childhood, but 
 No tears were at command the thorn to rout. 
 
 O Karl, physician dear past mortal ken! 
 
 This was a sug^ared medicine to me, 
 A bath of suasive oil to thorns within 
 
 Of deeper import barbed with misery. 
 
 That fated moment (strang-e! will tears come now?) 
 We sal upon the threshold of a home 
 
 Whose walls were crumbling-; ay, the broken vow, 
 A broken home, the broken dream had come. 
 
 The skeleton usurped the closet and 
 
 Peace fled for passions in wild ang-uish spoken; 
 Recriminations were in mad command, 
 
 A chaos reig-ned and thus the home was broken, 
 
96 TEARS. 
 
 Curse her who nursed your lips that both have kissed 
 A thousand thousand times — the lump appears 
 
 Here in my throat, before my eyes a mist, — 
 Would I could cry! words come not, neither tears. 
 
 But after all when Time heaps over us 
 Grim mounds of sand, our Samson hair all shorn, 
 
 What need of heaven to adjust abuse? 
 No need of hell, Delilah's being born. 
 
 And after all what need of physic tears 
 To sympathize with self inflicted woe? 
 
 There comes a season in the wailing- years 
 When thorns prick not and tears no longer flow. 
 
 And after all what need to fondle grief 
 
 As if a mistress cunning with soft wiles 
 To offer to the wounded heart relief. 
 Her lips a mocking pleasure, false her smiles. 
 
TKARS. c 
 
 Hot passions must apologize for leave 
 
 To found vagfue hells for one whose erring life 
 
 Burns its purgation here; cooled, they forgive 
 The unrepentant mother once a wife. 
 
 So after all when all is fully ended, 
 
 Both briefs before the high tribunal filed 
 
 Where arguments and palliations blend, it 
 May be that Justice will rest reconciled. 
 
 So, Time, benevolent with thorns, deny 
 Their access to the heart of Earl, our son; 
 
 Ivet no one deeper sink than what a sigh 
 May pluck and one tear usher to oblivion. 
 
gS 
 
 nVTiGHT in her wondrous arabesque of sky 
 
 Star jeweled and a loitering- summer moon 
 Charmed of her errand tho' the maze of June, 
 Bend o'er this Court of Honor rapturously. 
 Man would with Boreal colors nature vie 
 
 In wizard art: the painted sprays enswoon 
 The senses charmed; deft g-ondolas splash by 
 
 Ming-ling- strang-e airs with Sousa's lulling tune; 
 The mermaid-haunted fountain rivals all 
 In g-ush; white statues busy in their pose, 
 And every dome its lighted diamonds dons. 
 Here is my utmiost dream, art mag'ical ! 
 Ivcst the enchantment vanish I must close 
 
 E)ach eye in turn, nor risk them both at once. 
 
99 
 
 AN ARIZONA TOMB. 
 
 I^ 
 
 N Arizona lies 
 A tomb 
 To which g"lad. sunligh flies 
 But leaves in g-loom; 
 In it a victim slumbers; nature sig-hs 
 
 Around it at his doom: 
 And when the mDm.eats paint the shading 
 Of twilight skies there come all daunted 
 Thoug-hts shuddering- from chills pervading-, 
 As if the tomb were haunted. 
 
I OO ARIZONA TOM B. 
 
 A frig-htend rill 
 
 Runs by 
 
 With noisy courag-e till 
 
 The sandplain nig-h 
 
 I.S safely g-ained, then mock-heroic will 
 
 Send back the coward sig-h. 
 The coyotes move in troops along 
 The vale below with scarcer breath; 
 There hushed is every song-bird's song, 
 Mute crickets are as death. 
 
 The history? Alas! 
 A word — 
 Need it be written here? the glass! 
 Than which ne'er heard 
 Our race from lips pronouncing pass 
 One courted move, or blurred. 
 Still men are fools tho' drink be raging, 
 And men more raging heedless still, 
 Till wild contention such are waging 
 Bring-s ruin, sorrow, ill. 
 
ARIZONA TOMB. lOI 
 
 bsonie friend the clue 
 Ga ve me 
 Who thought hell's charms to woo 
 So potently 
 A reason furloug^hed spirits do 
 
 Repeat their rosary 
 If LfCthe twice they wander over. 
 We must turn back a page unread 
 ^ho' haunting spirits may so hover 
 Or not, above the dead. 
 
 Two beings met, 
 They loved: 
 Armand and Angelet — 
 How well 'twas proved! 
 The one a housling rose and pet 
 In famous beauty moved. 
 The other manly, handsome, winning, 
 But overshadowed b}^ the ban 
 Of his love's sire, not for his sinning, 
 He was a perfect man. 
 
I02 ARIZONA TOMB, 
 
 Both to him sped 
 To get 
 This parent's blessing-s shed 
 Upon them, yet 
 Fear crossed them — they were wed, 
 
 This Armand, Angelet. 
 They knelt, confessed— but for the blessing- 
 Received the father's wild anathema; 
 They rose heart-sore. Them sire addressing: 
 "Away!" quoth he — "but stay!" — 
 
 "You two are wed- 
 By law? — 
 Would God had struck both dead, 
 Or I ne'er saw 
 Thee, Angelet, upon whose head 
 
 This curse alight to awe: 
 May thy hereafter know no leisure 
 From prayer and misery to the hearse! 
 And, Armand, thine be gall from pleasure, 
 Away! Hell grant my curse." 
 
AlilZONA TOMB. 103 
 
 They drooped at this 
 Atid left. 
 Both facing" lesser bliss 
 For hearts were cleft. 
 The scornful sire did at them, hiss 
 Departing- spirit chafed. 
 O Aramand, Angelei! O sorrow! 
 Would the next page had ne'er been written; 
 But turn to it, to the to-morrow 
 Of these two beings smitten. 
 
 The bride's blood froze; 
 Her cheek 
 Grew sterile for the rose, 
 It died; nor seek 
 Did she to voice her hidden woes, 
 
 So fashioned mild and meek. 
 Poor Armand saw her sadly- wither; 
 His love, his fondling lost their charms 
 To woo her wasting figure hither 
 To his entwining arms. 
 
3 04 ARIZONA TOMB. 
 
 He took to grief, 
 
 And then, 
 
 The g-lass. I shall be brief. — 
 
 Nights found him in 
 
 The gambling dens a roystering chief — 
 
 Chief by brevet, of men. 
 No home, no wife set Him^ to thinking 
 Of ruin coming on apace; 
 By swaggering and braggart drinking 
 He ran the thorn-path race, 
 
 Thus on and on 
 Till woes 
 Came trooping not alotie. 
 His cherished rose 
 With dual dearth was nearly gone — 
 
 Not quite, for she arose . 
 From her lone couch and by it kneeling 
 Prayed: "O protect my Arniand, God, 
 Arouse him to his fuller feeling 
 Protect my Armand, God!" 
 
ART^iONA TOMB. I05 
 
 In Arinand came 
 Unheard, 
 Sneaking in drunken shame. 
 Coy and absurd. 
 Hearing- God coupled with his name 
 He paused to catch each word. 
 Stirred by the prayer he vowed to follow 
 Debauchery and crime no more! 
 No more in mires of sin to wallow. 
 By Ang-elet! he swore. 
 
 But hell within 
 
 Broke out; 
 
 Mis passion rose, a ditl 
 
 Whirling- about 
 
 III frenzy, fiotitig- in sin. 
 
 With orte Weird, maddeiled shout 
 He g-rasped hef by the flowing- tresses 
 Shrieking-, ''Madam, let you and G-od ne'er fret 
 IFor Armand," struck hef — heaven bless us! 
 Lo, dead lay Ang-elet! 
 
I06 ARIZONA TOMB, 
 
 O he awoke 
 To see 
 The victim of his stroke 
 And misery! 
 Did. hell or rumL his soul provoke, 
 Or was it Armatid free 
 In power and will who did the m.urder? 
 He, Armand — influence hypnotic 
 Thus to refute — and nothing- further, 
 Despite claims idiotic. 
 
 Sweet Ang^elet 
 
 I^ay dead 
 
 Just as her lips were set 
 
 On blessings wed 
 
 To Armand's name. Could he forg-et 
 
 What she and her mad sire said? 
 O prayer and misery! Your mission 
 Is being lengthened undiminished: 
 One g-alled by pleasure and perdition. 
 The other's prayer unfinished. 
 
ARIZONA TOMB. IO7 
 
 He left the room. 
 
 Upset 
 
 Lay chair, lamp, table, broom.; 
 
 The couch afret 
 
 Was fumbled, but the crowning- g-loom 
 
 Was pale, dead Ang-elet. 
 He left the scene, but to him stealing- 
 Came her unfinished prayer — she said: 
 "Protect my Ar — " there the appealing- 
 Changed voices with the dead. 
 
 He fled the home, 
 
 And still 
 
 That prayer abrupt would come 
 
 His soul to thrill; 
 
 Whcte'er on earth would Armand roatn 
 
 It must his nig-ht-ear fill. 
 Old Mexico forg-ot the murdered. 
 The cursing- sire and Armand fled 
 From whom since then there was no word heard; 
 The law had called him dead. 
 
lo8 ARIZONA TOME. 
 
 Could he forg-et 
 The stain 
 Upon his fing-ers set? 
 Blood marked its Clan. 
 To hush the prayer of Angelet 
 
 He noised all pleas in vain; 
 !For, ever like the echoes dying- 
 That aye rebounding- never die, 
 On burdened winds her voice came sig-hing*- 
 "Protect him, God on hig-h, 
 
 Protect my Ar. — " 
 No more, 
 The voice was hushed afar; 
 But every hour 
 Ag-airl repeated— -it would jar 
 Not silence passing- o'er 
 So softly Armand heard, no other: 
 Sad as the syllables of doom, 
 Sweet as the vesper plaints a mother 
 Breaths o'er the mossy tomb. 
 
ARIZONA TOMB. IO9 
 
 He sought the mines 
 Far west; 
 For gold framed no designs — 
 Nay, rest, for rest. 
 Mid miners, gamblers, libertines 
 
 He was forlorn, unblest. 
 Gold glittered in his path unheeded; 
 He squandered it in charities, 
 'Twas not the panacea needed; 
 His heart was ill at ease. 
 
 Still came to him 
 That prayer: 
 His head would reel and swim, 
 His eyeballs glare. 
 His record of the world grew dim, 
 
 Rem.orse bleached white his hair: 
 For aye his sleepless hours heard stealing — 
 "Protect my Armand, God, protect 
 My Ar — ^" there ceased the fond appealing 
 Where he the pleading checked. 
 
no ARIZONA TOMB. 
 
 "O bitter woe, 
 
 O God," 
 
 Poor Armand murmured low, 
 
 "I^et me not plod 
 
 Karth evermore!" But they who sow 
 
 The winds reap whirlv/inds. Odd, 
 "lyet you and God ne'er fret for Armand," 
 He rashly spoke in moments g-one; 
 Thus reaped he tenfold whirlwinds' harm and 
 The fretful prayer went on. 
 
 A hermit's cell 
 He dug- 
 Above the mountain dell 
 Where mag-ic drug- 
 Nor opiate could madness quell; 
 
 There death and life did tug 
 A clamorous and frenzied season, 
 Prolonging days and nig^hts with ills, 
 Of hope bereft, endurance, reason — 
 A fright among- the hills. 
 
ARIZONA TOMB. Ill 
 
 'Tis wrong- to say 
 
 That time 
 
 Moons measure, for one day 
 
 Of lives sublime 
 
 In woe finds more sands fall'n than may 
 
 Nile's pyramid outclimb. — 
 He killed himself. Beside a river, 
 The Gila's Pedro, lies his tomb; 
 Above the mound the zephyrs shiver 
 With nig-htfall's chilling- g-loom. 
 
 The story g-oes 
 
 They meet 
 
 At sunset, but who knows? 
 
 Our wand'ring- feet 
 
 Must halt before the tomb of woes, 
 
 Ivife's trag-edy complete. 
 If love could leave the tomb to g-reet us, — 
 We all have love-tombs somewhere prized, — 
 Our doubts would find their own quietus 
 And death were analyzed. 
 
112 
 
 ARIZONA TOMB. 
 
 "A inadman's grave," 
 The stone 
 Announces. Grass and wave 
 The leg-end moan 
 Where Gila's waters pitch and rave 
 For motives more unknown. 
 Some haunting- kindred we hereafter 
 May dub the airs and hills and river; 
 For here they moan or shriek in laughter 
 Beside the grave forever. 
 
 One needs not kneel 
 In prayer 
 Deep reverence to feel: 
 The listful air 
 Trembles in sympathy with some appeal 
 
 Of sorrow richly rare; 
 And after comes incessant weeping 
 Dews nightly never there loan tears — 
 Till dusky shadows off go creeping 
 And rose-cheeked morn appears. 
 
ARIZONA TOMB. II3 
 
 A city now adorns 
 
 The vale 
 
 Below, where cactus thorns 
 
 The tomb empale — 
 
 Appropriately Tombstone called — which warns 
 
 The tourist of this tale. 
 If fortune should your feet advise 
 On Arizona's sands to wander, 
 Approach the grave where Arniand lies 
 And o'er his madness ponder:— 
 
 Our action bring-s 
 
 To eyes 
 
 And hearts beyond us, stings, 
 
 Joys, tears and sighs; 
 
 To innocence our evil clings 
 
 And there the moral lies. 
 Heirs may hereafter know no leisure 
 From prayer and misery to the hearse 
 Because we quaff the gall of pleasure, 
 Bequeathing- but a curse. 
 
114 " ARIZONA TOMB. 
 
 In Arizona lies 
 
 The tomb 
 
 To which sad sunlig"ht hies 
 
 To leave in g-loom; 
 
 There nature squanders liberal sig"hs 
 
 To mollify the doom, 
 lyet twilig-ht's spirit count her beads 
 And finish her enchanted prayer 
 For Armand most his Ang-el needs 
 Where we must leave the pair. 
 
1^5 
 
 A CYNIC'S TALE. 
 
 A MINISTE^R to China whose full name 
 
 Is cloaked in darkness by indifferent fame. 
 Among- celestials sat at royal feast — • 
 One emperor, moguls the rest at least; 
 Not being- up on Chinese words, confound themi 
 Was down, of course, at jabber speech around him. 
 Without translation every dish he ate 
 Was strang-ely easy to amalgamate 
 With his American star-spang-led blood, 
 Especially one dish seemed mig-hty good; 
 And scheming to induce the western cook 
 To introduce it later, undertook 
 To question at his elbow sallow Johng-. 
 About this meat so famous in Hong" Kong. 
 The g-ourmand soon resolved in his sly brain 
 The mode of speech that would the secret g-ain. 
 
ii6 ■ cynic's tai^k. 
 
 He turned upon the oriental dude 
 
 Wrapped in a miracle of mag-nitude, 
 
 Who g-raced the seat of honor at his rig-ht 
 
 With fing-er pointing- to the mess in sight — 
 
 His sapient demeanor much enhanced 
 
 By elevated brows and chin advanced, 
 
 You could observe his vanity lean back 
 
 As he complacently inquired, "Quack, quack?' 
 
 None better knew than he it was no duck 
 
 But to dissolve a doubt this method took. 
 
 The shocked Celestial with a proud disdain 
 
 Curled lip and nostril in neg-ation plain; 
 
 No rag-g-ed g-amin on the street could jaw, 
 
 Disg-ust personified, more awful "naw!" 
 
 Then on our diplomat with scowling- brow 
 
 Growled in canine vernacular, "Bow, wow!" 
 
 "Dog- dast the Chinese!" thoug-ht the minister 
 
 When panic in his stomach 'g-an to stir; 
 
 The amphitheater within his brain 
 
 Inclosed a combat fearful in its strain 
 
 In which the Will and Fancj' tug-g-ed amain. 
 
cynic's tale. 117 
 
 But in his stornach greater battle raged 
 
 Where dog chased duck an awful turmoil wag-ed. 
 
 The Fancy proved victorious in the brain; 
 
 Below, the vanquished duck, was sadly slain. 
 
 His head revolved and then revolved his food 
 
 Till over China, ware and fare, he spewed. 
 
 Expelled the empire at next council, now 
 
 He snarls ki-yi, snaps, barks and bays bow wow! 
 
 An insane minister become crazed from it 
 
 His fancy dog--like runs to his own vomit. 
 
 The diplomat should be abandoned straig-ht 
 
 Had not philosophers beg^un to prate 
 
 Ag-ainst the wisdom of celestial diet 
 
 A morsel sweet however they denj' it. 
 
 These veg"etarians make feasts of reason, 
 
 Serve "dog- eat dog-" their pickeled wit for season; 
 
 Above board masticate infernal humors, 
 
 For vegetables pose as sturdy boomers; 
 
 Vitellus chide because he ate an ox 
 
 That ate their grass — upon them all a pox! 
 
 So mad I sret at all their theoretics. 
 
Il8 • cynic's TAtE\ 
 
 Their hjg'ienic laws and shilly ethics, 
 
 In doubt embroiling" every simple question 
 
 That patience dies and with it g-ood dig-estionj 
 
 A note opposed to their vile dog-mas you make, 
 
 Man 's not controlled by what pervades his stomach. 
 
 Some dupes there are who fancy that the bread 
 
 In Shakespeare's craw put Hamlet in his head; 
 
 And that, to amplify the thoug-ht profane. 
 
 In Rare Ben's stomach it had wroug-ht the Dane. 
 
 A rose in any garden is inclined 
 
 Rare bloom and odor in the earth to find, 
 
 While by its side skunk-cabbag-e will, I think, 
 
 Absorb from rose-nursed v^oil its shocking- stink. 
 
 To rose or weed the selfsame soil supplies 
 
 Conflicting odors, color color vies. 
 
 For reasons founded on this solemn fact 
 
 Their table conduct shows some brains half-cracked; 
 
 And one I now remember, an example 
 
 Of eaters who may prove a fair example. 
 
 Was Oscar Wilde, the poet, dude, or what not, 
 
 Who sat at meal an hour or more and got naught; 
 
cynic's tai^e. 119 
 
 But on a flower feasted eye and nose 
 
 Till from the table hung-erless he rose. 
 
 The waiter marveled, bill of fare declined, 
 
 While flowery Oscar tipped: "Thanks; I have dined.'' 
 
 Do you believe a meal of so much sentiment 
 
 Is worthy blistered hellroom — worth a cent, I meant? 
 
 No? Neither I. But what I first essayed 
 
 In mock-heroic couplets to dissuade, 
 
 An idea so popular of late, 
 
 Is, what we think proceeds from what we ate. 
 
 The minister, exception you may raise, 
 
 "Who ate the dog- now as a luneling bays; 
 
 Wilde Oscar to support the opposition 
 
 May too be cited from the superstition 
 
 Prevailing- now atavic in its power. 
 
 Admitting- he reverted to a flower. 
 
 Withal, environment is g-reater matter 
 
 Than diet, g-ranting- plent3^ to the latter. 
 
 Our dreams are shaded by our latest meal, 
 
 Ang-els or nio;hthag's as the meats reveal. 
 
 So comes it that the supper has control 
 
120 CYNIC S TAI^E. 
 
 O'er preg-nant matter of the sleeping- soul. 
 
 And what pervades the stomach, odd exceptions, 
 
 Is but the chyle of fancy's own deceptions, 
 
 Or fowl or dog- as man each likes or loathes 
 
 He tumbles into rhapsodies or oaths. 
 
 Meats as an influence have divers powers 
 
 Unsuited to the fop who dines on flowers; 
 
 These delicate for airy thoughts enhance 
 
 The azure flig-hts peculiar to romance; 
 
 While those equip for earth the mail-clad thoug-ht 
 
 That for inankind and robust reason foug-ht. 
 
 Serve Cleopatra hearts of turtle doves 
 
 When she would revel in ambrosial loves; 
 
 Within the ruby wine dissolve a jewel 
 
 When to her bosom's flame consig-ning fuel; 
 
 But if she would a sea fight win, then feed her 
 
 Substantial beef or pluck will supersede her; 
 
 Without this stronger diet, I repeat, 
 
 She will be food for asps or Caesar's meat. 
 
 To verify this theory I appeal 
 
 To history for what its tales reveal. 
 
CYNICS TAtE. 121 
 
 The Indian is savage not because 
 His crown of feathers borrows eag-le's claws, 
 Nor yet for reason of the wild deer food 
 That warms the current of his fiery blood; 
 This game predicament would be unlucky 
 In taming- Boone, the hunter of Kentucky. 
 Hence, I aver, give ear to this you ought, 
 All kinds of meat will furnish food for thought. 
 Moreover, brains their tendril nerves send forth 
 To forage on material of worth 
 For thought-construction in the workshop head, 
 Rejecting, brainy builder, stones for bread. 
 In following this tale with close attention 
 You note no failure adverse views to mention; 
 Dsnying which approach the feast in revel, 
 Go as a glutton after to the devil. 
 
122 
 
 CARDS. 
 
 Whist: 
 Ivife is a g-ame of whist: from unseen sources 
 
 The cards are shuffled and the hands are dealt; 
 Yet no one can control them, for the forces 
 
 That act unseen are no less strong-ly felt. 
 
 — lornquilL 
 
 "XXTHIST, Ironquill, is merely an exotic 
 Quite unbecoming- any loyal sport; 
 Americans appear unpatriotic 
 
 Who with our blulif g-ame are not en rapports 
 
 You know my meaning-? Doubtful as to "/" 
 I asked a Frenchman, my g-ood friend Broquet, 
 
 About pronouncing- it or not, said he: 
 
 "In whist all thing's are silent— in a way." 
 
 Shoot voiceless whist! Lfife is a g-ame of poker: 
 Men brag- and bluff and win for having- sand; 
 
 Despite the cards men who repine when broke err 
 The brilliant nerve outranks the master hand. 
 
CARDS. 123 
 
 Let Ware seek honors of the courtly whist; 
 
 A bobtail deal me, or a pair of deuces — 
 Naj^, worse — a measly kilter if you list, 
 
 And at life's showdown g-amble who the g"oose is. 
 
 The Joker: 
 
 TV^ING Georg-e the ^hird asked John Home Tooke 
 
 A g-ame of cards to play; 
 The wit in sarcasm humbly spoke 
 
 What time can not g-ainsay: 
 "My liegfe, your pardon I must crave, 
 I know not even King- from, knave." 
 
 Forimies: 
 
 A PACK of cards, much like mankind^ 
 We with these complications find: 
 In distribution of the parts 
 Observe clubs, diamonds, spades and hearts. 
 Wealth, diamonds: lucky they 
 Who either find along- the way. 
 
1-24 CARDS. 
 
 When coupled with a robust health 
 
 The world no equal has to wealth; 
 
 Althoug-h its owner be a vampire 
 
 He g-overns women, men and empire; 
 
 Ay, if a diamond, he at bay 
 
 Will throug-h all hindrance cut his way. 
 
 To diamonds draw and play them well; 
 
 They'll beat the devil out of hell. 
 
 And some aver, what we repeat here, 
 
 They turn the head and bolts of Peter* 
 
 The sainted turnkey of the skies 
 
 Where Dives has to exercise 
 
 The lowly camel's strateg-y 
 
 Before the portals passes he. 
 
 Not to dig-ress: — The needle's e^^e, 
 
 Throug-h which the camel needs must hie, 
 
 A stone arched gate of low desig-n 
 
 Was, not a needle superfine, 
 
 So loaded camels stooping crawled 
 
 Into Jerusalem rock walled. 
 
 Thus comes it that the rich man's soul 
 
CARDS. 125 
 
 By stooping- worms throug-h anj^ hole 
 Of upper Zion, as well niig-ht 
 Humped Dives or a Campbellite. 
 But to the subject let us back 
 Turn our attention. Take the pack — 
 Do me the kindness now to turn 
 A card for w^hat there is to learn: 
 A club for war — a readj^ g-uess, 
 A bloody business none the less. 
 I do not claim the vision g-iven 
 To seventh son of son No. VII, 
 Nor in the wiles of divination 
 Subvert my art to sink a nation; 
 But that calm country is the best 
 Which by the club is governed least. 
 The fates of countries we maj^ find 
 Applies as well to human kind: 
 Who wields the arrant club to g^ain 
 Desired ends is half insane — 
 I should say wholly, were it wise 
 The wrath of warriors to despise. 
 
126 CARDS. 
 
 Shun clubs: If you would win the day 
 Persuade, plead, arg-ue, reason — na.y, 
 Solicit, coax — or if the foe 
 Persistent hang, the point foreg-o; 
 Rather submit to proud defeat 
 Than with. a club the numskull beat. 
 Contention is the bane of ease. 
 Who would be happy must love peace: 
 Disputes breed war a blatant shame 
 To fire with blood a transient name. 
 And clubs add fuel to the flame. 
 Enoug-h of clubs, indeed, too much 
 Has now been wasted on the butch- 
 er of the ag-es whose vile looks 
 
 ("Grim visaged war" per other bard. 
 If one must here "speak by the card,") 
 Are all the histories of the books. 
 A card, please — Hearts, O loving- hearts! 
 That will exhaust our rhyming- arts. 
 The symbol is, precisely, love. 
 No hearts no love — remove your glove: 
 
CARDS. 127 
 
 Is 3'our hand warm, or cold is it? 
 
 The temperatures are opposite — 
 
 Cold hands implj^ warm hearts and vice 
 
 Versa, warm hands denote hearts icy. 
 
 You do not it believe? Nor I; 
 
 Warm hearts with warmth must hands supply. 
 
 But recollect my scheme is not 
 
 To fabricate the destined lot; 
 
 I read the card, announce the will 
 
 Ordaining- what fate must fulfill; 
 
 And, therefore, must I here repeat 
 
 Traditions, follow in the feet 
 
 Of wandering- ag-es, ycleped old, 
 
 Whose dog-ma is — hands warm, hearts cold. 
 
 However, I take liberij^ 't 
 
 Is not a rule that holds with feet: 
 
 A being- who has this cold member 
 
 Airs in her heart the shrill December. 
 
 June's face deceives by warmer smile. 
 
 Her foot betra3^s the heart the while. 
 
 Say that your wife soft sleep to mock 
 
128 ■ CARDS. 
 
 Her cold foot places where the shock 
 Electrifies the spinal column, 
 Then tell me, if you can be solemn 
 In serious words of log-ic's mig-ht, 
 Can such an iceberg-'s heart be rig-ht? 
 All this with cards has naug-ht at all; 
 Yet, easy conversational 
 Excursions here in verse must voice 
 Our predilections forced by choice. 
 You turned a heart. Consider, then, 
 What signifies a heart to men; 
 With women poets all contend 
 It is the middle, prime and end. 
 Includes all parts, their be-all here. 
 Full sway therein their proper sphere; 
 And Byron held "It 's woman's whole 
 Existence," writing- of some soul 
 Intensified by passions, we 
 Admit it in the maid Haidee. 
 A mooted question for the ermine 
 Judiciallv soon to determine— 
 
CARDS. 129 
 
 The law's delsij proverbial 
 
 Is grown, so courts would, sir, be all 
 
 Of twenty centuries at codes 
 
 And precedents and episodes 
 
 Out of the drift and current tide 
 
 Of law before they could decide 
 
 If men have hearts, and (please move nearer) — 
 
 Their lawful judgment would be error. 
 
 This serious dispute may well 
 
 Employ earth's parliaments to tell 
 
 On due inquiry, if there dwell 
 
 In bossoms male, a human heart 
 
 Whose love is something more than art. 
 
 Tell me at what it aims unless 
 
 Gross passions and huge selfishness: 
 
 Or candidly, unless half crazy. 
 
 Has man a heart? now, has he? has he? 
 
 You cannot answer. Who the devil 
 
 The mystery can then unravel? 
 
 You are upon my pen impaled; 
 
 Squirm not, a million others failed. 
 
I30 CARDS. 
 
 Believe me, what man calls his heart 
 
 Unsetisitive is as a wart 
 
 Ridging- the dermise of a toad 
 
 O'er which he in his dungfcart rode. 
 
 Men love themselves, and for a season. 
 
 Divest themselves of cooler reason. 
 
 Imagining" that state of thought 
 
 A stage of love which love is not. 
 
 They pawn for women all their wealth, 
 
 l/ose honor, glory, virtue, health; 
 
 And when despeptic then would prove 
 
 Their stomach's pangs allied to love. 
 
 The Gypsy harlot of the Nile's 
 
 O'erflowing slum employed her wiles 
 
 In snaring Caesar to her arms 
 
 Where Antony confessed her charms 
 
 With feasts and wines, with sighs and laughter; 
 
 In ribald slavery thereafter. 
 
 You may or may not call this passion, 
 
 I^xamples of the fervid trash on 
 
 The pages of seductive books: 
 
CARDS. 131 
 
 We merely say, like love it looks. 
 
 And there was saintly Abelard, 
 
 A subject for enamored bard, 
 
 With Heloise his abbess flame, 
 
 To carve himself a splendid name; 
 
 Ivove-characters yet warmer none 
 
 Has bold imagination shown 
 
 In history or wild romance 
 
 Than these two lovers dear of France. 
 
 Hearts more devoted no one knows, 
 
 Not Juliet and Romeo's. 
 
 But how far fiction now grown dim 
 
 As history, embellished them 
 
 We cannot know. 'Tis idle breath 
 
 To say that twenty years in death 
 
 The fleshless arms of Heloise 
 
 Wide opened to emparadise 
 
 The lover late entombed. I must 
 
 Embalm this fiction with their dust; 
 
 Or brand the story — do not take 
 
 Exception to the slang — a fake. 
 
132 CARDS. 
 
 A mad Italian once wa-s known 
 For Ivaura wed to rhyme and moan; 
 But Petrarch is the laug-hing- stock 
 Of wiser ag-es now that mock 
 His famous (undeserving- fame) 
 Ivove-laureled sonnets and his name. 
 She was a married matron who 
 His sonnets nor his passion knew: 
 She had no need of poet suitor, 
 A husband's love she found to suit her; 
 Although I must confess that I^raura 
 Possessed a faithful heart no more a 
 Component part of modern woman 
 Whose love for Juan proves her human. 
 Pet's love was simply figurative 
 Adorned by fancy's mood creative; 
 'Twas nothing (call me not unkind) 
 But love emotions in the mind. 
 Ivove in the head can never dwell — 
 Who can be wise and love, was well 
 Inquired into by L^ord Bacon, 
 
CARDS. 133 
 
 Or Mr. Shakespeare, if mistaken 
 The cryptograms that now so rave on 
 A whim to cheat the Bard of Avon. — 
 (And here I niig-ht devote a pag-e 
 To settle this contentious rage, 
 But will not for the claim, is silly — 
 Says Delver: "It is, will he, nil he, 
 He goes," the g-oodman Delver whom 
 To build unto the crack of doom 
 The mason, shipwright, carpenter 
 Most vainly rival, I concur; 
 He goes with me — or, rather, stays 
 The author of the "so-called plays.") 
 Ivove were we speaking of? not worse I 
 Conceive than Bacon's controversy. 
 1^0 ve must be found we said at start, 
 Not in the head but in the heart. 
 (A further license to digress 
 
 This opportunity affords: 
 For heads I^ord Bacon stands, no less 
 
 Than Shakespeare with the heart accords.) 
 
134 CARDS. 
 
 We speak of hearts: If men were wise 
 
 To scan this life with cloudless eyes. 
 
 They would a woman's love endeavor 
 
 To grapple to their hearts forever. 
 
 As for a man's love, we, alas! 
 
 Must do as he does, let it pass. 
 
 How easily may love depart 
 
 From burly man's mercurial hearti 
 
 L<et his fair amorosa slip, 
 
 Or woo a strang-er to her lip; 
 
 Be caug-ht romancing- with a friend, 
 
 And all his love is at an end. 
 
 But her devotion truly won 
 
 Makes her a martyr to the one; 
 
 Crime-tarnished, sinful, ever he 
 
 Rests safe in her idolatry. 
 
 So cherish hearts. A law there is 
 
 To find out true affinities; 
 
 A yearning- precept here I write: 
 
 Beware of love impelled at sight. 
 
 Another is of kindred force: 
 
CARDS. i35 
 
 Quick wedding-s bring- as quick divorce. 
 
 These do not warrant dilatory 
 
 Proceeding's in the lover's story; 
 
 For nothing- under starlit skies 
 
 Is so distressing- as dumb sig-hs. 
 
 If you would play the g-ame of hearts 
 
 By nature tutored, Ovid's arts, 
 
 Or other learned formulas — 
 
 "Woo like a king- and win the loss; 
 
 As Dryden intimated where 
 
 He feasts the Greek heroic pair, 
 
 *'None but the brave deserve the fain" 
 
 EJnough of love, of hearts enoug-h, 
 
 No more of amatory stuff — 
 
 Mere vapor of the bossom blown 
 
 To nothing-ness when all is known. 
 
 The last card turn: A spade! well said, 
 
 The last to ling-er with us dead. 
 
 Spades sig-nify the curse of sin, 
 
 Toil, dreary toil, the crossboned g-rin; 
 
 The sweating doom of Adam curs'd. 
 
I • CARDS. 
 
 For toil and death were spades made first. 
 
 Shun toil, shnn death, shun spades, shun sweat, 
 
 May admonition is a threat; 
 
 For lives are saddest that with these 
 
 Their trifling- hours rob of ease. 
 
 Spades, spades! Do you not comprehend 
 
 A dreary, hissing-, double end 
 
 Of sibilants in that sad word, 
 
 The deadest ever mortal heard? 
 
 Spades — toil, tears, sweat: there is the hell 
 
 Of which the church is wont to tell; 
 
 Destruction, death are in the term — 
 
 A trench of fate without a berme. 
 
 Spades, spades! avoid the g-loomy spades 
 
 Till death envelops you in shades. 
 
 Now nig-ht approaches, death's forerunner. 
 
 With m.onster appetite that sooner 
 
 Or later (lay the dollar, please, 
 
 There on my book) we must appease; 
 
 An appetite we all must cloy • 
 
 When spades and earth enshroud the joy 
 
CARDS. 137 
 
 Of life, love, war, wealth, toil and tears — ' 
 
 The period of blooming- years; 
 
 Death stops us all, the heart-beat too, 
 
 The heartache — true all have it, true! 
 
 The final, ultimate collapse 
 
 Of this org-anic force, perhaps — 
 
 And all life's purpose dare to fine us 
 
 For breathing friend, and so the finis. — 
 
 Where did you place the filthy stuff? 
 
 O here it is.^Of spades enoug^h, 
 
 Distress and tears; avoid them, friend, 
 
 They come at last, and there an end- 
 
t33 
 
 HDITH. 
 
 ^ I ^HKRlv is outside the train a mourner too, 
 
 Beyond the sable obsequies that move 
 In funeral line. Hearts are as warm, as true. 
 
 Tears are as burning-, love more likely love, 
 Affections touched and tendered by one who 
 
 Could not amid the g-roup her feelings prove. 
 The tomb is now your home? To it I turn 
 In thoug-hts, till flowers bloom, and talk and moum. 
 
 Who can preceive a flower is mine or theirs? 
 
 None will uproot it, for the neig-hboring- pod 
 Perchance there bursting" cast it, — or the airs 
 
 Of summer-land. And if the friendly sod 
 Do bravely for our flower that declares 
 
 Our sisterlove inamortal as the God 
 Who inade Us sisters, aiid yourself unleafned 
 In hate, 1*11 deeni my love you have not spurned. 
 
You were the last to kiss me of them all; 
 
 O dead lips, think of this tho' foes beguile 
 Its tenderness! You were the first to call 
 
 A welcome at the door, the last to smile 
 And clap the hand at parting-; 'mid the gall^ 
 
 The bitter, so much honey-sweet; and while 
 Thoughts hold I shall not this forget 
 In kindly l^dith, my sweet sister yet. 
 
 Tears now, and a cold grave, but after, Spring! 
 
 Then to the tiny mound, — Magic and lyife! 
 Up come the flowers, you sent them up, to bring 
 
 Me sympathy. Ijach petal deemed a leaf, 
 BJach flower a written letter answering 
 
 My flower of rhyme, thus hearing even deaf, 
 Speaking yet dumb. O run, tears, run, slow hour^, 
 Unto the Spring, unto the time of flowers! 
 
140 
 
 THE RED, RED WEST. 
 
 Give me no home 
 
 'Neath the pale, pink dome 
 
 Of E^uropean skies — 
 No cot for me 
 By the salmon sea 
 
 That far to the southward lies: 
 But away out west 
 I would build my nest 
 
 On top of a carmine hill, 
 Where I can paint 
 Without restraint 
 
 Creation redder still. 
 
 —Eiige?i€ Field. 
 
 Correct, my 'Gene, 
 
 Is your whim, I ween, 
 
 Regarding our red West— 
 Where the lurid hues 
 Are the sanguine views 
 
 Men hold till one cannot rest; 
 You may paint our head, 
 E^'en creation red — 
 
 Those red still a redder glow; 
 But pass one law, 
 A good old saw, 
 
 And let the white horse sfo. 
 
o 
 
 141 
 
 INEZ' SONG. 
 
 (FROM KING'S TOYS.) 
 
 NE) prayer — (frustrated chords, sing- low, 
 Ivow as my heart, guitar.) 
 Convey to Captain I^over, 
 A soldier and a rover. 
 
 If love be pain, love g-o — no, no! 
 
 (A jar, o'erlook the jealous jar.) 
 L<ove, go not: no, no, no. 
 
 O mellow murmurs to him say, 
 Ivow as a maiden kiss. 
 That if love g-o aflowering 
 He dare not be o'erpowering, 
 
 Then guilty flee away — nay, nay! 
 
 (O serpent strings, you hiss.) 
 I^ove never flees; naj^, nay. 
 
142 
 
 TO A SKUI.L. 
 
 \ STORY, Yorick, Dweller of the Cliff, 
 
 Whose tong-ueless skull is hollow as the grave, 
 A story of thy being- let us have. 
 Say, seeing you are purely human, if 
 From Adam's loins, or g-otten of a chief 
 "Whose paradise was this ill-favored cave; 
 How lived, how perished? You were never brave, 
 Rock-hedg-ed impreg-nably as Teneriffe: 
 Some vag-ue protectionist with narrow views 
 To shut out prog-ress; some crazed populist 
 
 Who stored his grain lest millionaires would 
 grow; 
 Some chimney-corner wit. — lycave you no clues? 
 No histories nor autographs exist; 
 
 "Alas, poor Yorick!" you I cannot know. 
 
H3 
 
 TO PROF. W. H. WYNN. 
 
 TJTOW long- will pens be silent with their fate? 
 In private study thrilled? It is not meet 
 Behind the door to quaff this water, stolen-sweet, 
 Intoxicating as the draught is; wait 
 No long-nr to be reckoned poet great, 
 
 Fearing some measure stagger on its feet; 
 Publish your rhymes and let the critic greet 
 "With smile or frown. Ivong years can not abate — 
 (For two and twenty years the same, in truth, 
 The wide-eyed boy admiring rhymes you wrought) 
 The love I felt for them, the love for you 
 And them I feel, a love begun when youth 
 lyooked up to lips mellifluent and thought 
 The bees must find their later Plato too. 
 
144 
 
 TI^RIEND, say of me if I should ever die— 
 
 For death is problematical at best, 
 Because anticipated by analog-y 
 
 Of logic's supple weapons deemed the least: — 
 "There lies a fellow who imagined he 
 
 Was born to live; and, rather curious! 
 Did live his life both fast and furious 
 
 Through some odd years or mayhap even, 
 Without a thought of hell or heaven, 
 And doubtful of the end or immortality. 
 He was a complicated mess of dust — 
 
 Good bad, indiiferent in more than one way; 
 And now the grave her mantle must 
 
 Throw over all that here remains of Conway. 
 
H5 
 
 THE SONNET. 
 
 "\TTRITEi fourteen lines distributing- the rhyme 
 As fancy's unconventional taste please, — 
 A common pretext may be found in these, 
 And follow octave with repeating- chime 
 In sestet as an echo marked in time: 
 
 Return, recede, diminish, till they cease — 
 Exemplifying- waves of rhapsodies, 
 But pause, if possible, with this line I'm 
 Unable to control. I did not cite 
 
 The rule, ten syllables compose each verse; 
 Involve the sense so Bacon could not con it; 
 Convey one thoug-ht, one only, thoug-h you write 
 One hundred forty words such to rehearse — 
 And there you have contrived the famous sonnet. 
 
146 
 
 THE SUICIDE. 
 
 TTTHO can with mental plummet sound the deep, 
 Sufficient wave of ag-onizing- care 
 That with the energ-y of mad despair 
 Stirred thy sore bosom so to woo death's sleep, 
 O sorry suicide? lyife cannot heap 
 Its surg-ing- griefs so hig-h, or bleach the hair 
 With faded hopes as to make heroes dare 
 Into the mystic future thus to peep. 
 And yet thou wast heroic, must have been, 
 To die by thine own hand so skillfully; 
 In time alone harmonious with death, 
 The action prompt — dramatic, save in scene. 
 The ox and ass solicited to sig'h 
 
 At, moribund barnstormer, thy last breath. 
 
147 
 
 THE POET. 
 
 \ BEAM of lig-ht hurled pell mell by the sun 
 
 Thro' utter darkness seeks its illstarred way, 
 Blind mole of space, without a g-limmered ray 
 To light the visored tale its fancy spun, 
 In utmost void a suicide mad run, — 
 
 Unless, perchance, some rambling- world, that may 
 - Possess congenial atmosphere, delay 
 Its course a burning moment, then is done. 
 So runs the poet his own soul illumed 
 
 By fires internal, darkness to famed eyes, 
 Save when athwart responsive medium 
 He dazzling into splendor, all consumed 
 In passions brilliant for the moment, dies; 
 Merged thus all eloquent, avoiding dum. 
 
148 
 
 Truth alone is beauty. 
 
 —Plato, 
 
 ^TTlTHIN the intellect all beauty lies 
 
 Of form or substance, attribute or deed; 
 As who can say this is a flower or weed 
 From wealth of odorous colors, if the eyes 
 Of nosing- analyst could not apprise [feed 
 
 The chambered judgment — whom five sumpters 
 Of all they forage in the garnered mead, — 
 Of vague suggestions bookish earth supplies. 
 No annotations on the margins penned 
 
 Convey the groupings pleasure would exact; 
 No variorum comment on the plan 
 Whose ultimate rejoicing is the end 
 
 Whsre fancy rambling deeper than the fact 
 Sees truth alone as beautiful in man. 
 
SEA FOAM. 
 
The followbig fragment is from SEA 
 FOAM J canto /, a poem conducted years ago 
 as far as three cantos, but unfinished. This 
 much is inserted here in order to /i?iish a siX' 
 teenth folder. Captain Kidd is hero of the 
 poem, Rosa his mistress, and hies their daugh- 
 ter. The scene is Havana. 
 
SEA FOAM. 151 
 
 xr^ix. 
 
 ^ I ^HE^ evening- revelry was therefore ended, 
 
 And late delaying- footsteps homeward strolled 
 From Almo's mansion. Nig-ht and silence blended; 
 
 The pulsing- Seabreeze, weary g-rown and cold, 
 The circled verg-e with Hesperus descended 
 
 To cool the hot sun boiling- molten g-old 
 Behind the sea. All were prepared for rest 
 Save Inez whom her maids for slumber dressed. 
 
 ly. 
 They left her; and their absence was relief. 
 
 About her anxious iips one could descry 
 The twitching-s of a melancholy g-rief 
 
 That unappeased stole forth a stifled sigh; 
 And on the sudden her whole frame, a leaf ^ 
 
 Or harpstring- filliped, trembled; by and by 
 She g-rew herself, and on the couch reclining- 
 Resolved by sleep to end her vag-ue divining-. 
 
 She could not slumber. Where the moonbeams' flare 
 
 Flecked patches thro' a casement rich in art. 
 By parted curtains screened, half languid, bare. 
 
152 SEA FOAM. 
 
 She lay within her careless robes apart, 
 Dreaming- of her Francisco, she the fair 
 
 Ophelia to the Hamlet of his heart; 
 Invoking- dreams reclined she sig-hing-, weeping-, 
 While thievish moonbeams stole about iher peeping-. 
 
 I.II. 
 I^ove languishing- she rose ag-ain; her head 
 
 Soft pillowed erst, long-ed for a fondling- palm. 
 "O night's somnific spell, O love!" she said, 
 
 "If I like this hushed world could be acalm!" 
 Then all above the window casing- laid 
 
 Her arms and shoulders for nig-ht's mellow balm, 
 While her sad breast moon-charmed as the sea 
 In rolling- billows heaved from wind to lee. 
 
 IvIII. 
 O could they see her eyes star-g-azing- then 
 
 While in the pathos of a lang-uid stare, 
 It would emblazon on the hearts of men 
 
 A spiritual look divinely fair. [when 
 
 Fring-ed lids trailed from bowed brows, as curtains 
 
 From arches trailing; her lips parted were 
 
SEA FOAM. 153 
 
 Ivike opening- poppies drowsy in the morning- 
 With dewdrops in their folds as teeth adorning-. 
 
 I.IV. 
 Her cheeks submerg-ed annotto with the hue 
 
 Of fading- roses; and her dang-ling- hair 
 In disconnected clusters, broug-ht to view 
 
 By most provoking- g-usts of wooing air, 
 About her dangled, yet oft' back she threw . 
 
 The veiling tresses streaming everywhere; 
 But of her eyes — 'twould be no great surprise 
 If every stanza told about her eyes. 
 
 IvV. 
 There is a lurking telltale ever haunts 
 
 The region of the eyes. When any soul 
 Is charged with feeling the tongue taunts 
 
 Expectant ears, conversing eyes control 
 The wires of electric glances, slants 
 
 Unutterable things and speaks a language whole; 
 The rhetoric* of eyes with bards is hoary, 
 But hers discoursed in wondrous oratory. 
 
 ♦Shakespeare: Did not the heavenly rhetoric of thine eye — 
 Shirley: Thy eyes express some rhetoric. 
 
154 SEA FOAM. 
 
 I.VI. 
 Indeed she is the beauty of the south. 
 
 Fresh as her blossoms, as her spring-tide mild, 
 And dark of eye as nig-ht. Her kiss-fond mouth 
 
 Would turn the lips and bow of Eros wild; 
 I'll dye the lily if you paint her youth, 
 
 I'll drape her bosom amorously piled. 
 Protruding in fond mischief, if you free 
 Her rhythmic step upbraiding- harmony. 
 
 IvVII. 
 There on the casement leaning lone as night 
 
 And watched by the rude eyes of sensual stars. 
 The lovely Inez dreamed. These dreams one nig-ht 
 
 Call abstract moonshine, true love's shilly cares, 
 Perplexing- dreams: she merely had a sig-ht 
 
 Of her Francisco. In her witching- snares 
 Some potent rival caug-ht him with weird shyness — 
 When all unwarned she heard his whispered "Inez." 
 
 lyVIII. 
 The daring- sound alarmed her. She withdrew 
 
 Her shapely shoulders; round her naked knees 
 And breast exposed she drew her robes in awe; 
 
SEA FOAM. 155 
 
 With cautions fear she peered into the trees — 
 O g-rand delig-ht! she her Francisco saw. 
 
 They whispered words inipalpable^the breeze 
 Was up and noisy, — but I saw hitn climb 
 Up to her window in a moment's time. 
 I^IX. 
 
 veil your blushing" faces, virg-ins chaste, 
 Whose cold, thin lips have never met a kiss; 
 
 And, startled matrons, hide your eyes in haste 
 If you deem Inez has preformed amiss; 
 
 She in this dishabille shocks ultra taste 
 
 Of some who urg-e g-ood breeding-, true it is; 
 
 But I am of opinion, say hers are ill, 
 
 That morals and not rags are best apparel. 
 IvX. 
 
 They kissed, — Inez, Francisco — 'tis no fancy. 
 For lovers in such thralling- moods seek bliss; 
 
 1 never could, nor do believe I can, see 
 More eloquence in lips than when they kiss; 
 
 There 's no deception in its necromancy — 
 
 Who kiss must love (off, Judas! that's not this.) 
 
156 SEA FOAM. 
 
 I love a kiss, prudes call it freedom; never! 
 'Tis bondage, for a kiss enthralls forever. 
 
 I^XI. 
 In strong- embrace of lock-linked arms entwining- 
 
 These pure exponents of love's happiness 
 Sat heart to heart and cheek to cheek inclining. 
 
 Fond as two souls can be in such excess 
 Of love; both tranquil, for no undermining 
 
 Rival was watching near to mar their bliss — 
 Tho' love is deeper set by difficulties, 
 From our conservatories we may all cull this. 
 
 IvXII. 
 A certain king* in painting, done by Ingres, 
 
 For the amusement of his children played 
 Horse on his hands and knees — nor would it injure 
 
 High dignity; — thus sportive all arrayed 
 Came an ambassador of pride to linger 
 
 In face-lit wonder at the figure made. 
 The flunkey would die first than do so, rather; 
 The monarch laughed, "O wait till you're a father!" 
 
 *Henry IV of France, the famous Heurj- of Navarre. 
 
SKA FOAM. 157 
 
 You mock true lovers, probably, when they 
 Are billing, cooing-, squandering- so many 
 
 Rapt hours, soft speech, deep kisses in dismay? 
 Then g-uy no more, 'tis idle; for if any 
 
 Convenient season come you cannot play 
 Both Jupiter and Cupid; near some canny 
 
 And wistful maid all must to love uncover — 
 
 Dissenting rogue, O wait till you're a lover! 
 
 LrXIV. 
 
 They sat upon the window fond as love 
 
 "When painted in a picture, and so near 
 Together that one moonbeam from above 
 
 Was crushed to death between them; not a fear 
 Had they but every dream their fancies wove 
 
 In curtains veiling each approaching year 
 Would outline heart's ease, make one sunny clime 
 To gild their castle in the realm of time. 
 
 IvXV. 
 There was religion in their chaste embrace 
 
 Out-tonguing any moral argument; 
 For, thoug^h a careless robe her form did grace, 
 
158 . SEA FOAM. 
 
 Or sntig-ly clasp her yielding-, fair extent, 
 Francisco idolized her rarest face 
 
 With fondest eyes and lips all negligent, 
 Parted when kissed, and kissed in parting, heart 
 Close up to lips that never meant to part. 
 
 IvXVII. 
 The low moon's streamers sloping down the sky 
 
 Cast silver mantles half about the twain; 
 It was the moment when they planned to fly 
 
 From friend, foe, Cuba to the sun-kissed Spain 
 Whose ship upon the shore weighed anchor nigh. 
 
 The scene was changed to action. In a train 
 Of ample silks enrobed she few tears shed, 
 Then with Francisco to the waters fled. 
 
 LXVIII. 
 We leave them for awhile upon the sea. 
 
 Old Neptune, keep your storming furies low; 
 And, rugged ship, rock gently, tenderly 
 
 When swaying with the billows to and fro. 
 My drowsy reader, you would better be 
 
 In bed — go to your prayers and couch * "^ *