Chapter VII: The Pear Tree 61

INSCRIPTIONS:

FOR A CHILD’S PLATE 62

FOR HIS CUP 62

FOR HIS CHAIR 62

FOR HIS BED 63

THE WANDERERS 64

MOTHERHOOD

The night throbs on: but let me pray, dear Lord!
Crush off his name a moment from my mouth.
To thee my eyes would turn, but they go back,
Back to my arm beside me where he lay--
So little, Lord, so little and so warm!

I cannot think that thou hadst need of him!
He is so little, Lord, he cannot sing,
He cannot praise thee; all his lips had learned
Was to hold fast my kisses in the night.

Give him to me--he is not happy there!
He had not felt his life: his lovely eyes
Just knew me for his mother, and he died.

Hast thou an angel there to mother him?
I say he loves me best--if he forgets,
If thou allow it that my child forgets
And runs not out to meet me when I come--

What are my curses to thee? Thou hast heard
The curse of Abel’s mother, and since then
We have not ceased to threaten at thy throne,
To threat and pray thee that thou hold them still
In memory of us.

See thou tend him well,
Thou God of all the mothers! If he lack
One of his kisses--Ah, my heart, my heart,
Do angels kiss in heaven? Give him back!

Forgive me, Lord, but I am sick with grief,
And tired of tears and cold to comforting.
Thou art wise I know, and tender, aye, and good.
Thou hast my child and he is safe in thee,
And I believe--

Ah, God, my child shall go
Orphaned among the angels! All alone,
So little and alone! He knows not thee,
He only knows his mother--give him back!

THE SLEEPY SONG

As soon as the fire burns red and low,
And the house up-stairs is still,
She sings me a queer little sleepy song,
Of sheep that go over the hill.

The good little sheep run quick and soft,
Their colors are gray and white:
They follow their leader nose to tail,
For they must be home by night.

And one slips over and one comes next,
And one runs after behind,
The gray one’s nose at the white one’s tail,
The top of the hill they find.

And when they get to the top of the hill
They quietly slip away,
But one runs over and one comes next--
Their colors are white and gray.

And over they go, and over they go,
And over the top of the hill,
The good little sheep run quick and soft,
And the house up-stairs is still.

And one slips over and one comes next,
The good little, gray little sheep!
I watch how the fire burns red and low,
And she says that I fall asleep.

THE GOLDEN DAYS

I wonder where the Fairy-book can be,
The book from which she read to you and me,
While the warm sunlight shifted down the tree?

_And the brown eyes turned downward to the leaf,
Tear-spotted by two tiny people’s grief,
When Death bound one more princess in his sheaf._

I wonder where the Rocking-horse has run
That carried us before the day was done,
To all the lands that lie beneath the sun?

_And the dear lips of her we loved so well
Kissed us more sweetly than our tongue could tell,
When the too daring riders swayed and fell._

I wonder where the crimson peaches grow
We caught together when she threw them, so,
And ran with her to hide them, laughing low?

_And her light feet were swifter yet than ours,
And her soft cheeks were like two rosy flowers--
Ah, Time and Death, ye two malignant powers!_

THE VIGIL

Nay, Lord, I pray thee call not me to fight!
I have crept out of day to bless the night.
_Hush, Son, and gather courage for the light!_

But see, I weary ere I have begun!
Give thou the battle to some worthier one!
_When have I offered thee to choose, my Son?_

Look how my eyes with loneliness are wet!
But give me once warm arms and lips close met.
_Into the desert, Son, thy way is set!_

Nay, then, thou leanest on a broken reed!
Music and mirth and fire and friends I need.
_They walk alone whom I have called to lead!_

How shall I lead who only know to stray?
Am I to shepherd them, who lose the way?
_Yet I require them of thee in that day!_

What if I will not? Let me be as these
That laugh and breed and die and have good ease!
_Nay, Son, the eye once bared forever sees!_

* * * * *

This only, Lord: what shall my gladness be
Who fight disheartened in life’s phantom sea?
_To make the bridge whereon they cross to me!_

What am I, Lord, that I should strive with fate?
Bring on the dawn, before it be too late!
_My Son, the dawn shall come, and thou wilt wait!_

* * * * *

Yea, Lord, and I lie broken in thy hand.
Heat me white hot, to forge as thou hast planned.
_Fear not, my Son, but I shall understand!_

Melt out my yielded soul in one red stream,
Perchance through thy white furnace hope may gleam--
_My Son, a rest thou hast not dared to dream!_

THE SEA MAN

It was the burgher’s daughter,
As fair as maid could be,
That loved too well the stranger,
A man from off the sea.

“_My mother she was a sea maid;
My father he loved no shore.
Thou must bury me under billows,
Or thou ne’er shall see me more!_”

She’s kissed him lip and forehead;
She’s given him her vow:
“Five-fathom sea shall cover thee,
But only love me now!”

* * * * *

For seven years her sleep is sweet
Against the sea man’s heart.
“But now hath come my time to die,
And now we twain must part.

“Farewell, my little daughter!
Farewell, my bonny son!
Last night the waves did call my name;
My life on land is done.”

She holds him close and closer;
The bitter tears fall down.
“Remember now thy maiden vow,
Or woe betide this town!

“_Remember the oath ye gave me,
Nor bury me but in sea,
For the ocean will come to seek its own
If ye cheat my waves of me!_”

Now come her haughty sisters;
Now comes her father stern.
“This deed brings little honor
For all the world to learn.

“Our fathers lie in holy ground;
Their tombs are carven well;
A heathen stranger cast a-sea
Were too much shame to tell!”

They’ve buried him in the minster high
That stands beside her door,
But the winds o’ the air have drowned the prayer,
And the sea foams up the shore.

* * * * *

“Mother, I hear the billows roll,
I hear them hiss and moan!”
“Nay, little son, their fury’s done,
’Tis but the wind alone.”

“Mother, I smell the salt sea wind,
I taste the salt sea spray!”
“Nay, daughter mine, some dream is thine,
I’ll sing thy fear away.”

“Mother, we cannot hear thy voice!
The sea rolls loud and high!
It rushes up the minster street
And flings the church door by!”

The waves pour out the windows wide,
They’ve washed the altar bare,
They’ve torn the flowers from the stranger’s tomb,
And heaped wet sea-weed there!

* * * * *

It was the burgher’s daughter
That made her prayer in vain,
For all that drownèd city
Was never seen again.

For all its goodly gardens,
For all its towers so high,
Five-fathom sea rolls over it
And shuts it from the sky.

_Then bury the sea man deeply,
Five fathom out from shore,
Lest the ocean come in to find him,
And ye see the sun no more!_

THE SONS OF SLEEP

Now the wayfaring, now the restless earth,
Descrying on her dim and trackless verge
The dear, awaited dawning of the night,
Moves slowly in a languor of desire,
And drifts into the haven of her sleep.

Like dropping of the sweet and gradual rain,
Full flooding all the parchèd doors of growth,
The multitudinous lips of all the flowers,
The whispering insistence of dry leaves,
All cool and rill-like flowing, falls our sleep.

As the long thunderous surge of ocean waves
That lull eternally the listening shore,
Slow sweeping in from vast and caverned depths,
Comes the white tide that washes loose our souls,
To drown them tenderly in depths of sleep.

Soft stealing like the swathed and plumèd dusk,
Enwrapped in shadows, shod with silences,
Unceasing, unresisted, unobserved,
Embosoming the lapsed and languid earth,
Slips o’er the sons of men close-feathered sleep.

By day they walk diverse and isolate,
Sunken in self they skulk their separate ways,
Poor fugitives of fate, awhirl in time,
Groping for fellow-hands they dare not grasp,
Grudging the thriftless hours they yield to sleep.

But now, relaxed and drifting with that stream
Whereon they taste soft moments of the voyage
Whose unknown port no seaman of us all
Evaded ever, these swift, swarming souls
As one glad band of brothers sink in sleep.

Surely the great and tireless Heart of all,
Grievèd by day for their perversity,
Joys in them as they lie, breast soft on breast,
Hand locked in hand, a fathom deep in dreams,
And brims anew the cooling wells of sleep!

FOUR SONGS

I. THE PEASANT GIRL

Beyond the sea he goes, beyond the sea.
Does he look back to Arcady and me?
And yet, how could it be?
How should he mate with such a maid as I?
Ah, let him go--good-by!

Beyond my sight he goes, beyond my sight.
Does he look back and say, “My sweet, good-night”?
And yet, is love so light?
How should he know the pain I could not tell?
Ah, let him go--farewell!

Beyond my prayer he goes, beyond my prayer.
Does he look back from out the great world there?
And yet, how could I dare?
How should he know if love be wrong or right?
Ah, let him go--good-night!

II. AN INTERLUDE

I was within her heart that one short year
(But that is long ago and far away!).
Her soul’s sweet spring,
The while she waited for that greater thing,
Should blow to blossom all the buds of May.

I was within her heart that one short year
(But that is hidden, lost, and gone away!).
She was not mine,
But ere the glorious harvest moon could shine
There beamed on me the crescent moon of May.

I was within her heart that one short year
(But that has faded faint and soft away!).
Though the year’s night
Draws on, and all about the snow falls white,
Across my heart there blows a breath of May.

III. HEART’S SEASONS

When Love went holidaying
Among the autumn leaves,
They bloomed in sweet betraying,
The purple clouds, soft straying,
Held daylight back, delaying
To gild the glowing sheaves--
When Love went holidaying
Among the autumn leaves.

When Grief came on a-sighing
Behind the flowers of spring,
They withered to their dying,
The homing birds, slow flying,
Sang wintry songs, denying
The joy that June should bring--
When Grief came on a-sighing
Behind the flowers of spring.