Chapter III: Ballade of Woman

A woman! lightly the mysterious word
Falls from our lips, lightly as though we knew
Its meaning, as we say--a flower, a bird,
Or say the moon, the stream, the light, the dew,
Simple familiar things, mysterious too;
Or as a star is set down on a chart,
Named with a name, out yonder in the blue:
A woman--and yet how much more thou art!

So lightly spoken, and so lightly heard,
And yet, strange word, who shall thy sense construe?
What sage hath yet fit designation dared?
Yet I have sought the dictionaries through,
And of thy meaning found me not a clue;
Blessing and breaking still the firmest heart,
So fairy false, yet so divinely true:
A woman--and yet how much more thou art!

Mother of God, and Circe, bosom-bared,
That nursed our manhood, and our manhood slew;
First dream, last sigh, all the long way we fared,
Sweeter than honey, bitterer than rue;
Thou fated radiance sorrowing men pursue,
Thou art the whole of life--the rest but part
Of thee, all things we ever dream or do;
A woman--and yet how much more thou art!

ENVOI

Princess, that all this craft of moonlight threw
Across my path, this deep immortal smart
Shall still burn on when winds my ashes strew:
A woman--and yet how much more thou art!

THE MAGIC FLOWER

You bear a flower in your hand,
You softly take it through the air,
Lest it should be too roughly fanned,
And break and fall, for all your care.

Love is like that, the lightest breath
Shakes all its blossoms o'er the land,
And its mysterious cousin, Death,
Waits but to snatch it from your hand.

O some day, should your hand forget,
Your guardian eyes stray otherwhere,
Your cheeks shall all in vain be wet,
Vain all your penance and your prayer.

God gave you once this creature fair,
You two mysteriously met;
By Time's strange stream
There stood this Dream,
This lovely Immortality
Given your mortal eyes to see,
That might have been your darling yet;
But in the place
Of her strange face
Sorrow will stand forever more,
And Sorrow's hand be on your brow,
And vainly you shall watch the door
For her so lightly with you now,
And all the world be as before.
Ah; Spring shall sing and Summer bloom,
And flowers fill Life's empty room,
And all the singers sing in vain,
Nor bring you back your flower again.

O have a care!--for this is all:
Let not your magic blossom fall.

BALLADE OF LOVE'S CLOISTER

Had I the gold that some so vainly spend,
For my lost loves a temple would I raise,
A shrine for each dear name: there should ascend
Incense for ever, and hymns of golden praise;
And I would live the remnant of my days,
Where hallowed windows cast their painted gleams,
At prayer before each consecrated face,
Kneeling within that cloister of old dreams.

And each fair altar, like a priest, I'd tend,
Trimming the tapers to a constant blaze,
And to each lovely and beloved friend
Garlands I'd bring, and virginal soft sprays
From April's bodice, and moon-breasted May's,
And there should be a sound for ever of streams
And birds 'mid happy leaves in that still place,--
Kneeling within that cloister of old dreams.

O'er missals of hushed memories would I bend,
And thrilling scripts of bosom-scented phrase,
Telling of love that never hath an end,
And sacred relics of wonder-working grace,
Strands of bright hair, and tender webs of lace,
Press to my lips--until the Present seems
The Past again to my ensorcelled gaze,--
Kneeling within that cloister of old dreams.

ENVOI

Princesses unforgot, your lover lays
His heart upon your altars, and he deems
He treads again the fair love-haunted ways--
Kneeling within that cloister of old dreams.

AN OLD LOVE LETTER

I was reading a letter of yours to-day,
The date--O a thousand years ago!
The postmark is there--the month was May:
How, in God's name, did I let you go?
What wonderful things for a girl to say!
And to think that I hadn't the sense to know--
What wonderful things for a man to hear!
O still beloved, O still most dear.

"Duty" I called it, and hugged the word
Close to my side, like a shirt of hair;
You laughed, I remember, laughed like a bird,
And somehow I thought that you didn't care.
Duty!--and Love, with her bosom bare!
No wonder you laughed, as we parted there--
Then your letter came with this last good-by--
And I sat splendidly down to die.

Nor Duty, nor Death, would have aught of me:
"He is Love's," they said, "he cannot be ours;"
And your laugh pursued me o'er land and sea,
And your face like a thousand flowers.
"Tis her gown!" I said to each rustling tree,
"She is coming!" I said to the whispered showers;
But you came not again, and this letter of yours
Is all that endures--all that endures.

These aching words--in your swift firm hand,
That stirs me still as the day we met---
That now 'tis too late to understand,
Say "hers is the face you shall ne'er forget;"
That, though Space and Time be as shifting sand,
We can never part--we are meeting yet.
This song, beloved, where'er you be,
Your heart shall hear and shall answer me.

TOO LATE

Too late I bring my heart, too late 'tis yours;
Too late to bring the true love that endures;
Too long, unthrift, I gave it here and there,
Spent it in idle love and idle song;
Youth seemed so rich, with kisses all to spare--
Too late! too long!

Too late, O fairy woman; dreams and dust
Are in your hair, your face is dimly thrust
Among the flowers; and Time, that all forgets,
Even you forgets, and only I prolong
The face I love, with ache of vain regrets--
Too late! too long!

Too long I tarried, and too late I come,
O eyes and lips so strangely sealed and dumb:
My heart--what is it now, beloved, to you?
My love--that doth your holy silence wrong?
Ah! fairy face, star-crowned and chrismed with dew--
Too late! too long!

THE DOOR AJAR

My door is always left ajar,
Lest you should suddenly slip through,
A little breathless frightened star;
Each footfall sets my heart abeat,
I always think it may be you,
Stolen in from the street.

My ears are evermore attent,
Waiting in vain for one blest sound--
The little frock, with lilac scent,
That used to whisper up the stair;
Then in my arms with one wild bound--
Your lips, your eyes, your hair.
Never the south wind through the rose,
Brushing its petals with soft hand,
Made such sweet talking as your clothes,
Rustling and fragrant as you came,
And at my aching door would stand--
Then vanish into flame.

CHIPMUNK

Little chipmunk, do you know
All you mean to me?--
She and I and Long Ago,
And you there in the tree;
With that nut between your paws,
Half-way to your twittering jaws,
Jaunty with your stripèd coat,
Puffing out your furry throat,
Eyes like some big polished seed,
Plumed tail curved like half a lyre . . .

We pretended not to heed--
You, as though you would inquire
"Can I trust them?" . . . then a jerk,
And you'd skipped three branches higher,
Jaws again at work;
Like a little clock-work elf,
With all the forest to itself.

She was very fair to see,
She was all the world to me,
She has gone whole worlds away;
Yet it seems as though to-day,
Chipmunk, I can hear her say;
"Get that chipmunk, dear, for me----"
Chipmunk, you can never know
All she was to me.
That's all--it was long ago.

BALLADE OF THE DEAD FACE THAT NEVER DIES

The peril of fair faces all his days
No man shall 'scape: be it for joy or woe,
Each is the thrall of some predestined face
Divinely doomed to work his overthrow,
Transiently fair, as flowers in gardens blow,
Then fade, and charm no more our listless eyes;
But some fair faces ever fairer grow--
Beware of the dead face that never dies.

No snare young beauty for thy manhood lays,
No honeyed kiss the girls of Paphos know,
Shall hold thee as the silent smiling ways
Of her that went--yet only seemed to go--
With April blossoms and with last year's snow;
Each year she comes again in subtler guise,
And beckons us to her green bed below--
Beware of the dead face that never dies.

The living fade before her lunar gaze,
Her phantom youth their ruddy veins out-glow,
She lays cold fingers on the lips that praise
Aught save her lovely face of long ago;
Oblivious poppies all in vain we sow
Before the opening gates of Paradise;
There shalt thou find her pacing to and fro--
Beware of the dead face that never dies.

ENVOI

Prince, take thy fill of love, for even so
Sad men grow happy and no other wise;
But love the quick--and as thy mortal foe
Beware of the dead face that never dies.

THE END OF LAUGHTER

O never laugh again!
Laughter is dead,
Deep hiding in her grave,
A sacred thing.
O never laugh again,
Never take hands and run
Through the wild streets,
Or sing,
Glad in the sun:
For she, the immortal sweetness of all sweets,
Took laughter with her
When she went away
With sleep.

O never laugh again!
Ours but to weep,
Ours but to pray.

THE SONG THAT LASTS

Songs I sang of lordly matters,
Life and death, and stars and sea;
Nothing of them now remains
But the song I sang for thee.

Vain the learned elaborate metres,
Vain the deeply pondered line;
All the rest are dust and ashes
But that little song of thine.

THE BROKER OF DREAMS

Bring not your dreams to me--
Blown dust, and vapour, and the running stream--
Saying, "He, too, doth dream,
Touched of the moon."

Nay! wouldst thou vanish see
Thy darling phantoms,
Bring them then to me!
For my hard business--though so soft it seems--
Was ever dreams and dreams.

And as some stern-eyed broker smiles disdain,
Valuing at nought
Her bosom's locket, with its little chain,
Love's all that Love hath brought;
So must I weigh and measure
Thy fading treasure,
Sighing to see it go
As surely as the snow.

For I have such sad knowledge of all things
That shine like dew a little, all that sings
And ends its song in weeping--
Such sowing and such reaping!--
There is no cure but sleeping.