Chapter II

All the winds of the sea weary,
All the waves of the sea rest,
All the wants of my heart settle
Softly now in my breast.
All the stars that in heaven anchor,
Golden buoys of Elysian light,
Send me across the gulf promise
That I am faring right.

So while clouds that are left lonely
At the gates of the far West
Wait, so still, for the moon's stiller
Stealing from her nest,
I am held by a low vesper
Haunting afar the vague twilight,
Then with my soul at peace whisper
Hallowedly good-night.

A SONG OF THE SECTS

(_In a Jerusalem tavern_)

A Latin and Greek, praise God, are we, Armenian and Copt, And we're all drunk as drunk can be, for we've together sopped. Not one of us but spits at the creed the others mouth and purr, But we all believe, we all believe, in the Holy Sepulchre!

_The Armenian sings_

The Copt comes out of Egypt-land and with a braggart face He'll tell you that his fathers piled the Pyramids in place. In his Monophysite Christ we set no faith, the blasphemer! But we all believe, we all believe, in the Holy Sepulchre!

_The Latin sings_

The Greek will curse you if you call his Ikons images, And damns your soul to Hell--no purgatory, if you please! About Procession of the Ghost he's prickly as a burr, But he believes, as we all believe, in the Holy Sepulchre!

_The Copt sings_

Of heretics God leaves unburnt, Armenians are worst, They will not celebrate the Day, that was for Christ the first. No wine with water mixed for them, as well mix heathen myrrh-- Or not believe, as we all believe, in the Holy Sepulchre!

_The Greek sings_

The Latin swears his Roman Pope is judge infallible. Wherefore you may be very sure the Devil from his skull Will drink a toast unto all liars, who such a lie aver-- Tho they believe, as we all believe, in the Holy Sepulchre!

_The Four again_

A Latin and Greek, praise God, are we, Armenian and Copt, And we're all drunk as drunk can be, for we've together sopped. Not one of us but hankers to hang all Jews on a Juniper, For we all believe, we all believe, in the Holy Sepulchre!

THE CITY

Soft and fair by the Desert's edge, And on the dim blue edge of the sea, Where white gulls wing all day and fledge Their young on the high cliff's sandy ledge, There is a city I have beheld, Sometime or where, by day or dream, I know not which, for it seems enspelled As I am by its memory.

Pale minarets of the Prophet pierce Above it into the white of the skies, And sails enchanted a thousand years Flit at its feet while fancy steers. No face of all its faces to me Is known--no passion of it or pain. It is but a city by the sea, Enshrined forever beyond my eyes!

VIA AMOROSA

(_To A. H. R._)

When we two walk, my love, on the path
The moon makes over the sea,
To the end of the world where sorrow hath
An end that is ecstasy,
Should we not think of the other road
Of wearying dust and stone
Our feet would fare did each but care
To follow the way alone?

When we two slip at night to the skies
And find one star that we keep
As a trysting-place to which our eyes
May lead our souls ere sleep,
Should we not pause for a little space
And think how many must sigh
Because they gaze over starry ways
With no heart-comrade by?

When we two then lie down to our dreams
That deepen still the delight
Of our wandering where stars and streams
Stray in immortal light,
Should we not grieve with the myriads
From East of earth to West
Who lay them down at night but to drown
The longing for some loved breast?

Ah, yes, for life has a thousand gifts,
But love it is gives life.
Who walks thro his world alone e'er lifts
A soul that is sorrow-rife.
But they to whom it is given to tread
The moon-path and not sink
Can ever say the unhappiest way
Earth has is fair to the brink.

DUSK AT HIROSHIMA

Softly the bamboo bends As the sun sinks down unglowing, Softer the willow ends A sigh to the dusk around. Quickly the brief bat wends His flittering way, thro flowing Fields of the autumn air, That are husht of the city's sound.

Temple and thatch and stream Are forgetting the light that lingers, Mountain and mist in dream Already are lost, afar. Faintingly comes the beam Of the moon--then viewless fingers Tinkle a samisen, And astir on the East is a star.

THE WANDERER

When moonlight on the face
Of the great Buddha falls
As he sits in Nirvana
On the shores of Kamakura,
When the pines about him place
Soft shadows at his feet
Like offerings of penitence and tears,
I hear in the grace
Of the wind's low susurra
A voice that calls me still
To my home within the West,
But I've lingered overlong
In the East's strange arcana
And no more is there desire within my breast.

I left it when a boy,
That far home and, alas,
'Twas so fair that my dreaming
Earth had fairer was a madness.
I left it for the joy
Of wandering the world,
And heathen-hearted lands have I beheld!
But when at last cloy
Of delight brought sadness
Like lotus to my veins,
And forgetfulness seemed fate,
I had fared unto this shrine
And the moon as now was beaming,
And here have I awaited--and await.

But not for any gift
Of its god, or any grace
That in living or in dying
Men in text or sutra sigh for.
And not for any shrift
Nirvana has, or skies
Where Paradise imperishably smiles.
But only for the sift
Of the wind, that seems to die for
My soul's enduring peace
In the dwelling of the Tomb.
And only for the drift
Of the moon that comes denying
Eternity to everything but Doom.

IN A SHINTO TEMPLE GARDEN

Under the torii, robed in green,
The old priest creeps to the shrine.
Over the bridge the still stork stands,
The crow caws not in the pine.

Far in the distance bugles blow,
War's bloody memory wakes.
The priest prays on--for his sons that are dead,
And the heart within him breaks.

FAR FUJIYAMA

Against the phantom gold of failing skies I see the ghost of Fujiyama rise And think of the innumerable eyes That have beheld its vision sunset-crowned. The peasant in his field of rice or tea, The prince in gardens dreaming by the sea, The priest to whom the sêmi in the tree Was but some shrilling soul's incarnate sound.

And as I think upon them, lo, the trance Of backward time and distant circumstance, Of Karma's all-remembering necromance, Lies suddenly before my boundless sight. It is as if, a moment, Buddhahood Were given to me; as if understood At last were vague Nirvana's vaguer good; As if time were dissolved in living light.

ON MIYAJIMA MOUNTAIN

(_To A. H. R._)

Out on the sea the sampans ride And the mountains brim with mist and sun. O we are in Japan again And the spell is about us spun! The spell of the old enchanting East, Of Buddha and many a blissful priest, The spell that has never, never ceased To haunt us!

Glad we behold the temple-tops And the lanterns in religious row Standing, like acolytes of stone, Where the pine and camphor grow. And o'er them the old pagoda prays Blessing upon their dreaming days, And upon the eightfold sacred ways From Sorrow!

Ah, and the torii too is there Where the tranced sea enters to his shrine Daily, with tidal mystery And majesty divine. He enters now, as the nuptial sea Of love first entered our hearts, to be Lord of their tides eternally, And Master!

OLD AGE

I have heard the wild geese,
I have seen the leaves fall,
There was frost last night
On the garden wall.
It is gone to-day
And I hear the wind call.
The wind?... that is all.

If the swallow will light
When evening is near;
If the crane will not scream
Like a soul in fear;
I will think no more
Of the dying year,
And the wind, its seer.

ON THE YANG-TSE-KIANG

Down the Yang-tse bat-wing junk
And tatterdemalion sampan glide,
Sails of brown and black and yellow swinging.
Down the Yang-tse bat-wing junks
Fish-eyed and gaudy take the tide,
Forth to the sea in sloth they ride,
The coolies singing.

Off in the field the peasant toils
And along the canal the low tows slip,
Fruit of the red persimmon piled upon them.
Off in the field the peasant toils--
With lip and brow the dull years strip
Bare of the dreams of life, whose grip
Has grimly drawn them.

High on the hill the yamên rests
And the temple beside it sleeps in sun,
Far in the distance faints the city dreary.
High on the hill the yamên rests,
And dun dead shadows o'er it run:
This is the land where Time begun
And now grows weary.

THE SEA-ARMIES

The wild sea-armies led by the wind
Are following in our wake,
White-crested shouting millions moving on.
They have broken their camp of Calm and o'er
The world rebellion make,
With banner of cloud and mist above them drawn.

They have heard the call of infinite Death,
The ordering of his word,
"Arise, go forth and conquer where ye can;
For that is the only law ye know,
Its mandate men have heard,
Let them beware when they your path would span.

"Let them beware, for I am lord
Of all that on earth has name,
And unto you is given most my might.
Ride on, ye have many a ship to rend,
And many a mast to maim,
And many a land to lash and soul to fright."

So on they ride, a ravaging horde,
From shore to shuddering shore,
Beyond us in the bleak star-buried dawn;
Nor know that when they have camped again
And sleep, Life will restore
Unto her world the hope they have withdrawn.

THE CHRISTIAN IN EXILE

(_Mandalay_)

The palms along the old fort wall are paling,
The mountains in the evening light are red,
The moon has dropped into the moat from heaven,
A spell barbaric over all is spread.
But what is that to him, a stranger lonely,
In a land strange to all his faith and dim?
He cares not for old splendours, he would only
Hear on the air a simple Sabbath hymn.

The paddy-birds their snowy flight are taking
From the tall tamarind unto their nest,
The bullock-carts along the road are creaking,
The bugles o'er the wall are sounding rest.
On a calm jetty looking off to Mecca
Sons of Mahomet watch the low day's rim.
He too is waiting for it--with an echo
Upon his lips of a believer's hymn.

The red gate-towers rise against the twilight,
The palace of the heathen king is hid,
The white bridge bent across the moat beside it
Seems now of all unholinesses rid.
He wishes it were so with all this city
Whose Buddha-built pagodas skyward swim;
But he can only gaze on them and pity--
And sing within his heart a Christian hymn.

THE PARSEE WOMAN

(_At Bombay_)

Cast me out from among you,
I will not see my child
Laid aloft where the vultures
May clamour for him, wild!
The earth you say is holy,
Not to be soiled by death,
And a Parsee still should hold divine
What Zoroaster saith.

Ay, and so I will hold it,
But see his pale sweet face,
As pure as the palest flower
Left dead in Spring's embrace.
The sun we worship daily
Shrined it for seven years,
Then shall it go to cruel beaks,
There where the sea-wind veers?

No, no, no! tho you send me
A beggar from your door,
You, my lord, whom I honour,
And you, his sisters four,
To whom there have come no children
To make your bosoms feel
How even a thought so full of throe
Can make my sick brain reel.

Ah, you are deaf? you scorn me
And loathe, as a thing defiled?
My lord, I am but a woman
Who longs to see her child
Laid in a tomb, entreasured
Under the shrouding sod.
O would I had never given birth,
Or that earth had no God!

SHAH JEHAN TO MUMTAZ MAHAL

I see as in a pale mirage
The palm that o'er you sways,
The waters of the Jumna wan are beating.
One pearl-cloud, like a far-off Taj,
A dome of grief betrays--
Its beauty as was yours will be too fleeting!

The world is wider than I knew
Now that your face is gone!
While you were here no destiny seemed boundless.
So I am lost and find no clue
To any dusk or dawn!
Life has become a quest decayed and groundless.

Come back! come back or let me find
The jungle leads at last
Unto your lips and bosom recreated!
O somewhere I again must wind
My arms about you, cast
Into one word my love all unabated!

PRINCESS JEHANARA

Where the road leads from Delhi to the South, And dingy camel-trains creep in the dust Past ruin-heaps of old Firozabad And Indropat unpitied of the drouth; By a lone tree, above a Pool whose sad Prayer-water all the turban-people trust, Is a heat-hidden tomb, and on it just A few faint blades of bent and grieving grass. "Jehanara's it is," with ready mouth A Moslem tells the stranger, "once she said, 'The covering of the poor is only grass, Let it be mine alone when I am dead.'" And who has stood there, where about her Rest Rise high Imperial tombs, knows hers is best.

A SINGHALESE LOVE LAMENT

As the cocoanut-palm
That pines, my love,
Away from the sound
Of the planter's voice,
Am I, for I hear
No more resound
Your song by the pearl-strewn sea!
The sun may come
And the moon wax round,
And in its beam
My mates may rejoice,
But I feast not
And my heart is dumb,
As I long, O long, for thee!

In the jungle-deeps,
Where the cobra creeps,
The leopard lies
In wait for me.
But O, my love,
When the daylight dies
There is more to my dread than he!
Harsh lonely tears
That assail my eyes
Are worse to bear,
For the misery
That makes them well
Is the long, long years
That I moan away from thee!

O again, again,
In my katamaran
A-keel would I push
To your palmy door!
Again would I hear
The heave and hush
Of your song by the plantain-tree.
But far away
Do I toil and crush
The hopes that arise
At my sick heart's core.
For never near
Does it come, the day
That draws me again to thee!

ON THE ARABIAN GULF

From a far minaret of faithful cloud A wraith-muezzin of the sunset cried Over the sea that swung with sultan pride, "Allah is Beauty, there is none beside! Allah is Beauty, not to be denied By Death or any Infidel dark-browed!"

And every wave that worshipped, every one Under the mosque of heaven arching high, Lifted a white crest with assenting sigh And answered, "Let all gods but Allah die, Yea, let all gods! until the world shall cry, Beauty alone is left under the sun!"

THE RAMESSID

Upon an image of immortal stone, Seated and vast, the moon of Luxor falls, Lending to it a stillness that appals, A mystery Osirian and strange. The hands outplaced upon the knees in lone And placid majesty reveal the power Of Egypt in her most triumphal hour, The calm of tyranny that cannot change. It is of that Great king, who heard the cries Of millions toil to lift him to the skies, Who saw them perish at their task like flies, Yet let no eye of pity o'er them range. What rue, then, if his desecrated face Rots now at Cairo in a mummy case?

IMMORTAL FOES

At Bedrashein between the pyramids I saw the wingèd sun fold up his pinions And sink into the nether world's dominions Where Set sent ill on the Egyptian dead. I saw the ancient Desert, that outbids The Nile for the date-lands between them spread, Fling over Memphis that is vanishèd, Another shroud of sand, then bid his minions, The winds, lie down upon their boundless bed.

I saw where temples vowed to Serapis And granite splendours men name Pharaonic Are kept by Time in silence and sardonic Concealment--mummied in deep mystic tombs. And when the stars came out in quiet bliss, I heard Eternity with all its dooms, Past and to come, sound softly the mnemonic Of Death who waits all worlds that Life enwombs.

THE CONSCRIPT

The camel at the old sakiyeh Toils around and round. Aweary is he of the Nile And of the wailing sound Of the slow wheel he turns all day To lift the water on its way Over the fields of Ahmed Bey, That with green grain abound.

Aweary is he, too, of fellàheen Who compel him on, With thick-voiced chanting till the day Over the West has gone. For the bold Desert was he made, The Bedouin, his lord, to aid, Not for this peasant wheel of trade That ever must be drawn.

But on he toils while dahabiyeh And dark felucca glide Below him on the glassy flow Of the gray river's tide. Then when the night has come lies down, In sleep the servile day to drown-- Like all whom Life turns with a frown From their true fate aside.

NAVIS IGNOTA

Lord, what ship goes forth to-day? I see her setting West. Shall she have thy winds aright, Stars to guide her with their light, Shall she sweep the seas to sight Of land and harbour-rest?

Awful is thy ocean-wrath, And none can chart thy shoals When storm unassuaging hath Blotted sun and planet-path. Shall she, Lord, escape the scath And live, with all her souls?

For it is a beauteous thing That ships should sail the sea. Splendid is their plunge and swing Into waves that foam and fling Maelstroms at their bows to bring Them down to destiny.

And she, too, courageous rides Away into the gloom. Now her lights are lost in tides Of the windy spray that glides Thro the darkness, Lord, abides Thy Dove with her--or Doom?

I shall know perhaps some day, Or, knowing not, recall How my heart was fain to pray For a ship that bravely lay To her task: O Lord, so may Each vessel of us all!

THE CROSS OF THE SEPULCHRE

Within the Holy Sepulchre, breast-high, There is a cross uncounted lips have kissed, Millions the world to dust has long dismissed, Millions that now hope of it but to die. Pilgrims, I saw, from out far fervid lands Of superstition, North and West and South, Bend to it each a trembling, reverent mouth, Then kneel where Christ was said to loose Death's bands. And then I wondered if He who believed In the One God were wounded sore by this, Whether He shrinks at each ecstatic kiss, Or knowing how humanity is grieved, Knows too that it is better to give Hope Than Truth, if only one is in man's scope.

THE NUN

A lone palm leans in the moonlight
Over a convent wall.
The sea below is waking and breaking
With quiet heave and fall.
A young nun sits at the window;
For Heaven she is too fair;
Yet even the Dove of God might nest
In her bosom beating there.

A lone ship sails from the harbour:
Whom does it bear away?
Her lover who sin-hearted has parted
And left her but to pray?
She has no lover, nor ever
Has heard afar love's sigh.
Only the convent's vesper vow
Has ever dimmed her eye.

For naught knows she of her beauty,
More than the palm of its peace;
And who beyond Christ's portal to mortal
Desires would bend her knees?
The ways of the World have flowers,
And any who will pluck those;
But let there ever be a place
Where none may pluck God's rose.

ALPINE CHANT

I'm tramping thro the mountains, They are rising white around me, Snow peaks like patriarchs That Winter has enthroned. I'm tramping up the valleys Where the cataracts sound me Thunders they have shrilly From eternity intoned.

I'm tramping thro the mountains, With the clouds for my companions, Soft clouds that float and cling From crag to cloven crag. I'm passing by the chalets That o'erhang the high cañons, Passing where the shepherds And the flocks they pipe to lag.

I'm tramping thro the mountains Where the pines in proud procession Climb like a hardy host To halo-heights of sun. I'm listening for the sallies Of the avalanche's Hessian Hurl of ice and granite Into gulfs Avernian.

I'm tramping thro the mountains And the wind is yodling to me Yearnings of the glaciers To flow to summer lands. I'm treading up the valleys With no wanting to undo me-- For to-day I'm goalless And the great God understands!

THE MAN OF MIGHT

No moment drooped between his thought and action,
No morrow died between his dream and deed.
Within his soul there was no fatal faction
That could betray him in his hour of need.

IN TIME OF AWE

The fierce sea-sunset over the world Springs like a wounded spirit, The waves all day have hissed and hurled Their fangs and the spray has swept and swirled, And ships in the gray gale's lair have furled Their sails--well may they fear it!

The night will be but a monstrous seethe Of terrors elemental. The clouds will wrap in a ghastly wreath Of gloom the winds that in them breathe, And all that lives in the sea beneath By fear shall be made gentle;

And sink down, down to the nether deeps, Below the foam and fretting. Down where the sullen water sleeps Alway and the slow sand coldly creeps Over the lone wreck, which Death keeps To guard him 'gainst forgetting.

And there in the ominous vast calm They'll harbour, like enchanted Chill shapes he has strangely conjured from The silence of his masterdom; There float till again they feel the qualm Of hunger thro them panted.

And then once more far up will they spring, To drift and sport and plunder, Shark, eel and whale and devil-thing, With tooth to rend and tail to sting. To the sea, O God, does horror cling And haunting past all wonder.

SUNRISE IN UTAH

The dun sand-cliffs that break the desert's sea Rose suddenly upon my sight at dawn, And terrible in an eternity Of death took silently the sunrise on. Purple funereal from rifted skies Swept down across their proud sterility, Only to die as here all glory dies, On barrenness I did not dream could be. O God, for a bird-song! or opening lips Of but one flower upon the fatal air, For but the voice of water as it drips, Or stir of leaves the day-wind makes aware! O God, for these, for life! or from the face Of the world wipe so irreparable a place!

CONSOLATION