Chapter XII: Epilogue (3)

There, beneath some blazing vine,
Where the liquid moonlight glitters
Of a river,--coral litters
Red with grail,--like prisms in wine
I have watched the fishes shine.

Or, o’er sunset-colored moss,
Glow-worms trail their beryls; sprinkling
Green the smouldering shade; while, twinkling,
With convulsive sapphire gloss,
Fireflies rained blue lights across.

Where the reeds seemed rays of rose,
And white mirrored moons, the lotus--
Each a spirit giving notice
Of the inner light that glows
Where the under water flows--

Shapes arose of flashing spray:--
Where, a wild auroral splendor,
Rolled the forest,--emerald-tender
As the light of breaking day,--
Beckoned forms of starry ray.

Through the violetish light,
Winged with nautilus and lily
Flame, adown the forests stilly
Vistas, moony whirls of white,
Floated shapes with eyes of night.

I must follow where she leads.--
Blinding portals of her castle
To my entering feet are facile....
Love no terrible trumpet needs
At her gates to bugle deeds....

Lo, my being never veils
Aught from her. To her caresses
All my heart knows it confesses
With a faith that never fails,
Though it hears the truth that wails
In its soul’s admonishment,
Of the curse that sits in session
In each amorous expression
Of her love; its violent
Flame, by which my life is rent.

I have drained the feverish cup
Of all darkness. Made a leman
Of an elemental demon;
And my soul lies, staring up,
Draining poison at each sup.--

While she smiles on me ’tis well:
I shall follow, though she make me
What her self is; never wake me
From the dream I can not tell,
That is neither heaven nor hell:

Where I drink mesmeric gold
Of wild vision,--that romances
In informing Protean fancies
With a beauty never old,
And emotion never cold.--

Let me drink and never wake
From the trances that environ
Me, and ’neath the subtle siren
See the demon, like a snake,
With destroying eyes that ache.

While the slow laconic look
Of her eyes express no censure,
Gazing in them, I adventure,--
Far beyond the wisest book,--
Ways her serpent fancy took.

Yet I know I reverence
One whose gaze in God’s negation;
One who, like an emanation
Of all evil, chains my sense
With satanic influence.

Yet, while still I hear her say,
“One more kiss before the morning!
One more bliss for love’s adorning!
One more kiss ere break of day,”
Still my soul with her must stay.

Stay, nor know, nor ever see!
Till her basilisk beauty flashes,
And the curse, from out the ashes
Of her passion, fiery,
Strikes--destroying utterly.

LYANNA.

“_These elementary beings, we are told, were by their constitution more long-lived than man, but with this essential disadvantage, that at death they wholly ceased to exist. In the meantime they were inspired with an earnest desire for immortality; and there was one way left for them, by which this desire might be gratified. If they were so happy as to awaken in any of the initiated (Rosicrucians) a passion, the end of which was marriage, then the sylph became immortal._”--Godwin’s “Lives of the Necromancers.”

Summer came over the Indian Ocean
Girdled with fire, tiaraed with light;
Her eyes all languor, her lips--a potion
To quaff--of poppy. And gold and white
She flashed and sparkled; all gleam and motion,
All blush and blossom she came; and I,
Of the race of the sylphs, o’er the Indian Ocean
Followed her through the sky.

Self-exiled so from the sylphs that cluster,
Pulsing with pearl and burning with blue,
In domes of the dawn,--where the organs bluster
Low of the winds,--where they glow like dew
As the day dreams up, and their armies muster,
Ranges of glitter, in cloudy gold,
At the gates of the Dawn, of blinding luster,
To forth when her gates unfold.

For Summer murmured me, “Follow! follow!”
Whispered one word that was all of love.--
Winged with the speed of the sweeping swallow,
I followed the word she had breathed above:
“Follow! follow!”--the god Apollo
Never followed, with speed as strong
The flying nymph through holt and hollow,
As I that word of song.

Fleet as the winds are fleet, yea, and fleeter
Far than the stars that throb, like foam,
Through the firmament’s blue, in musical metre
Winnowed my wings; and the golden gloam
Rang; and life was a passion, completer
Than a life in Eden; and love,--a lyre
That sang in my heart and made life sweeter
With hope,--a leaping fire.

Thus to the north my wings went maying
Radiant ways, till a castle shone
Gaunt on great cliffs, with the late skies graying
O’er walls of war and their towers lone,
With tortuous steps to the sea, where, spraying,
Thundered the breakers; and terrace and stair,
Rock o’er the waters, rose rosy and raying
Deep in the sunset’s glare.

A dewdrop burns when the dawn lights prickle:
And all my being tingled with light,
Bloomed when I saw her, tarrying fickle,
White on the castled height:
Slender she shone as the moon in sickle,
The slim new-moon, like a pearl-pale streak;
And golden, too, as the honey-trickle
Of combs where the wax is weak.

In dreams I came to her, lo! as a vision:
Yea, by her side as a dream I stood;
To her innermost spirit I sighed my mission,
In the vestal ear of her maidenhood:
And she deemed me a dream; and I made a prison
Of my arms for her soul while she, smiling, slept:
Her body lay still, but her soul had arisen,
And looked on my face and wept:

“Lyanna, I hoop thee with arms of fire!”--
My words were music, a harp afloat,--
“Lyanna, my heart is a vibrant wire,
Thy love is its only note.
Let it sing forever. Let it sound entire,
Full as the angels’ who hover and harp
To the glory that’s God, like a golden lyre
Borne in a beam that is sharp....

“Behold me, thy rose! full of flame and splendor!
Thy rose to pluck: thy ruby bloom:
Thy sylphid rose, with eyes that are tender;
Lips that are fire; and limbs of perfume
And fragrant fire: thy heart’s defender!
Thy airy lover!” ... And, bending above,
Sweeter my speech than a flower’s that, slender,
Tells to the stars its love.

Lo, as I spoke, with thoughts that thicken,
Her heart seemed filled; and she spoke; but sleep
Shadowed her words, till my kiss did quicken
And free, like stars from the night that leap:--
“Long I have waited; and long did sicken
To clasp thee thus, O my rose of love!
Oft have I dreamed of thee, yea, and was stricken
With joy at the thought thereof.

“White are the clouds; but I saw thee whiter
’Mid dazzling domes of the dawn; and knew
Tho’ bright are God’s stars, that thine eyes were brighter,
Brighter and burning blue.
And my heart was thine, though it held thee slighter
Than hues that the mists of the morning take:
And waited and yearned, and the yearning tighter
Than tears in the hearts that break.

“‘Lyanna! Lyanna!’ I heard thee ever
Calling ‘Lyanna,’ a ripple of flame:
‘Lyanna! Lyanna!’ like song forever;
And I marveled at my name.
The sound was such--that if stars could sever
And silver-syllable a word of beams,
So would it sound.--I turned; but never
Beheld thee, only in dreams.

“Thou walkedst a beauty afar: a glitter
Of gleaming aroma: and I, with moan,
Reached thee my arms: but thy gaze was bitter,
Calmer and sterner than stone:
Avoiding thou passedst in scorn: a sitter,
I seemed, on the uttermost bounds of bliss:
When, lo! on the wind,--a flame, a flitter
Of fire,--thy laugh, and thy kiss!”--

I had won her love. And, behold! the thunder
Trumpeted tempest: I heard the seas
Lunge at the walls like a roaring wonder,
And the rain-wind sing in the trees.--
Lyanna my bride.--And the heavens asunder
Rushed--chasms of glaring storm, where poured
The thunder’s cataracts, rolling under--
And showed me, horde on horde,

The shouting spirits of storm.--The portal
Of sleep was riven; she rose, and saw:
And I said to her soul, “Of the utterly mortal
Mine the eternal lot and law.”--
“I love thee!” she answered.--And I, “Immortal
Am I through thy love!” ... And so we fled....
Behold! when they came in the morn, astartle,
Men whispered--“Lyanna is dead!”

THE SPIRITS OF LIGHT AND DARKNESS

_Voices of Darkness_

Ere the birth of Death and of Time,
And of Hell, with its tears and its torments:
Ere the waves of heat and of rime,
And the winds to the heavens were as garments:
Cloud-like in the womb of Space,
Mist-like from her monster womb,
We sprang, a myriad race
Of thunder and tempest and gloom.

_Voices of Light_

As from the evil good
Springs, and desire:
As the white lily’s hood
Buds from the mire:
So from this midnight brood
Sprang we with fire.

_Voices of Darkness_

We had lain for long ages asleep
In her bosom, a bulk of torpor,
When down through the vasts of the deep
Clove a sound, like the notes of a harper:
Clove a sound, and the horrors grew
Tumultuous with turbulent night,
With whirlwinds of blackness that blew,
And storm that was godly in might.
And the walls of our dungeon were shattered
Like the crust of a fire-wrecked world:
As torrents of clouds that are scattered,
From the womb of the deep we were hurled.

_Voices of Light_

Us in unholy thought
Patiently lying,
Eöns of violence wrought,
Violence defying;
When, on a mighty wind,
Voiced of a godly mind,
Big with a motive kind,
Girdled with wonder,
Flame and a strength of song,
Rolling vast light along,
Thundered the Word, and Wrong
Vanished,--and we were strong,
Strong as the thunder.

_Voices of Darkness_

We people the lower spaces,
Where our cities of silence make scorn
Of the sun, and our shadowy faces
Are safe from the splendors of morn.
Our homes are wrecked worlds and each planet
Whose sun is a light that is sped;
Bleak moons, whose cold bodies of granite
Are hollow and flameless and dead.

_Voices of Light_

We in the living sun
Live like a passion:
Ere the sad Earth begun
We and the sun were one,
As God did fashion.
Lo! from our burning hands,
Flung like inspired brands,
Sowed we the worlds, like sands,
Countless as ocean:
And ’tis our breath gives life,
Life to those stars, all rife
With iridescent strife,
Music and motion.

_Voices of Darkness_

We joy in the hate of all mortals;
Inspire their crimes and the thought
That falters and halts at the portals
Of actions, intentions unwrought.
We cover the face of to-morrow:
We frown in the hours that be:
We breathe in the presence of sorrow:
And death and destruction are we.

_Voices of Light_

We are man’s hope and ease,
Joy and his pleasure;
Authors of love and peace,
Love that shall never cease,
Free as the azure.
Lo! we but look, and light
Heartens the world with might,
Vanquishes death and night
Hate and its burnings:
And from our bosoms stream
Beauty and yearnings
For a diviner dream,
Higher discernings.

_Voices of the Break of Day_

Morning and birth are ours;
Light that is blown
From our fair lips; and flowers,
Dropped from our hands in showers,
Seeds that are sown:
Song and the bursting buds,
Life of the fields and floods;
Strength that’s full-grown:
And, from our beryl jars,
Filled with the clouds and stars,
Pour we the winds and dew;
While by our eyes of blue
Darkness is rent in two,
Conquered and strown.

_Voices of the Dawn_

Ye in your darkness are
Dark and infernal;
Subject to death and mar!
But in the spaces far,
Like our effulgent star,
We are eternal.

THE WATER WITCH

See! the milk-white doe is wounded.
He will follow as it bounds
Through the woods. His horn has sounded,
Echoing, for his men and hounds.
But no answering bugle blew.
He has lost his retinue
For the shapely deer that bounded
Past him when his bow he drew.

Not one hound or huntsman follows.
Through the underbrush and moss
Goes the slot; and in the hollows
Of the hills, that he must cross,
He has lost it. He must fare
Over rocks where she-wolves lair;
Wood-pools where the wild-boar wallows:
So he leaves his hunter there.

Through his mind then flashed an olden
Legend told him by the monks:--
Of a girl, whose hair is golden,
Haunting fountains and the trunks
Of the woodlands; who, they say,
Is a white doe all the day,
But when woods are night-enfolden
Turns into an evil fay.

Then the story once his teacher
Told him: of a mountain lake
Demons dwell in; vague of feature,
Human-like; but each a snake,
She is queen of.--Did he hear
Laughter at his startled ear?
Or a bird?--And now, what creature
Is it,--or the wind,--stirs near?

Fever of the hunt! This water,
Falling here, will cool his head.
Through the forest, dyed in slaughter,
Slants the sunset; ruby-red
Are the drops that slip between
Hollowed hands, while on the green,--
Like the couch of some wild daughter
Of the forest,--he doth lean.

But the runnel, bubbling, dripping,
Seems to bid him to be gone;
As with crystal words and tripping
Steps of sparkle luring on.
Now a spirit in the rocks
Calls him; now a face that mocks,
From behind some boulder slipping,
Laughs at him through lilied locks.

And he follows through the flowers,
Blue and gold, that blossom there;
Thridding twilight-haunted bowers
Where each ripple seems the bare
Beauty of white limbs that gleam
Rosy through the running stream;
Or bright-shaken hair, that showers
Starlight in the sunset’s beam.

Till, far in the forest, sleeping
Like a luminous darkness, lay
A deep water, wherein, leaping,
Fell the Fountain of the Fay,
With a singing, sighing sound,
As of spirit things around,
Musically laughing, weeping
In the air and underground.

Not a ripple o’er it merried:
Like the round moon in a cloud,
In its rocks the lake lay buried:
And strange creatures seemed to crowd
Its dark depths: dim limbs and eyes
To the surface seemed to rise
Spawn-like; or, all formless, ferried
Through the water shadow-wise.

Foliage things with woman faces,
Demon-dreadful, pale and wild
As the forms the lightning traces
On the clouds the storm has piled
In the darkness.--On the strand--
What is that which now doth stand?--
’Tis a woman: and she places
On his arm a spray-white hand.

Ah! two mystic worlds of sorrow
Were her eyes; her hair, a place
Whence the moon its gold might borrow;
And a dream of ice her face:
Round her hair and throat in rims
Pearls of foam hung; and through whims
Of her robe, as breaks the morrow,
Gleamed the rose-light of her limbs.

Who could help but gaze with gladness
On such beauty? though within,
Deep within the beryl sadness
Of those eyes, the serpent sin
Seemed to coil.--She placed her cheek
Chilly upon his, and weak
With love-longing and its madness
Grew he. Then he heard her speak:--

“Dost thou love me?”--“If surrender
Of the soul means love, I love.”
“Dost not fear me?”--“Fear?--more slender
Art thou than a wildwood dove.
Yet I fear--I fear to lose
Thee, thy love.”--“And thou dost choose
Aye to be my heart’s defender?”--
“Take me. I am thine to use.”

“Follow then.--Ah, love, no lowly
Home I give thee.”--With fixed eyes
To the water’s edge she slowly
Drew him.... Nor did he surmise
Who this creature was, until
O’er his face the foam closed chill,
Whispering, and the lake unholy
Rippled, rippled and was still.

THE SUCCUBA

I have dreams where I believe
That a queen of some dim palace,
One, whose name is Genevieve,
Weighs me with her love or malice:
She is dead and yet my bride:
And she glimmers at my side
Offering a crystal chalice
Filled with fire, diamond-dyed.

I have dreams. Ah, would that I
Might forget them!--I remember
How her gaze, all icily
Draws me, like a glowing ember,
Up her castle-stair’s pale-paved
Alabaster, from the waved
Ocean, grayer than November,
Where I linger, soul-enslaved.

Walls of shadow and of night
Lit with casements full of fire,
Somber red or piercing white:
As the wind breathes lower, higher,
Round the towers spirit-things
Whisper, and the haunted strings
Moan of each huge, plangent lyre
Set upon its four chief wings.

In its corridors at tryst
Flame-eyed phantoms meet. Its sparry
Halls are misty amethyst:
Battlemented ’neath the starry
Skies it looms; the strange unknown
Skies where, green as glow-worms, sown,
Gloom the stars; the moon hangs barry
Beryl, low and large and lone....

Can it be a witch is she?
Or a vampire? she, far whiter
Than the spirits of the sea!--
She whose eyes are cold, yet brighter
Than her throat’s pale jewels. Lo!
Flame she is though seeming snow:
And her love lies tighter, tighter
On my heart than utter woe.

Though I dream, it seems I live;
And my heart is sick with sorrow
Of the love that it must give
To her; passion, it must borrow
Of herself, unhallowed, vain;
Then return it her again:
Thus she holds me; and to-morrow
Still will hold with sweetest pain.

In her garden’s moon-white space
Strangest flowers bloom: huge lilies,
Each one with a human face;
Knots of spirit-amaryllis;
Cactus-bulks with pulpy blooms
Gnome-like in the silver glooms;
And dim deeps of daffadillies,
Fay-like, brimming faint perfumes.

But to me their fragrance seems
Poison; and their lambent lustre,
Spun of twilight and of dreams,
Poison; and each pearly cluster
Hides a serpent’s fang. And I,
Looking from an oriel, sigh;
For my soul is fain to muster
Heart to breathe of them and die.

Then I feel big eyes, as bright
As the sea-stars. Gray with glitter,
She behind me, moony white,
Smiles, ’mid hangings wherein flitter
Loves and deeds of Amadis
Darkly worked. And then her kiss
On my mouth falls; sweet and bitter
With a bliss that is not bliss.

And I kiss her eyes and hair;
Smooth her tresses till their golden
Glimmer sparkles. Everywhere
Shapes of strange aromas, holden
Of the walls, around us troop;
And in golden loop on loop,--
Of the lull’d eyes vague beholden,--
Forms of music o’er us stoop.

Yet I see beneath it all,
All this sorcery, a devil,
Beautiful, and white, and tall,
Broods with shadowy eyes of evil:
She, who must resume with morn
Her true shape: a cactus-thorn,
Monstrous, on some lonely level
Of that demon-world forlorn.

I have dreams where I believe
That a queen of some dim palace,
One, whose name is Genevieve,
Weighs me with her love or malice:
And all night I am her slave
There beside the demon wave,
Where I drain the loathsome chalice
Of her love, that is my grave.

MASKS

_Cucullus non facit monachum_

Live it down! as you have spoken
You could live it ere you knew
What love was--“a bauble broken,
Foolish, of a thing untrue.”--
You, Viola, with your beauty,
Cloistered, die a nun? No! you--
You must wed: it is your duty.

There’s your poniard; for the second
In this tazza dropped: the blood
On it scarcely hard.... I reckoned
Happily that hour we stood
There upon your palace-stairway,
How, with the Franciscan hood
Cowled, I said, there was a bare way.

In the minster there I found it--
Our revenge. I saw him, wild,
Stalking towards the church: around it
Dogged him, marking how he smiled
In the moonlight where I waited.
When the great clock, beating, dialed
Ten, I knew he would be mated.

Heaven or my better devil!--
Hardly had his sword and plume
Vanished in the dark, when, level
On the long lagoon, did loom,
Under moonlight-woven arches,
Her slim gondola: all gloom:
One tall gondolier: no torches.

Dusky gondolas kept bringing
Revellers: and far the night
Rang with instruments and singing.--
From the imbricated light
Of the oar-vibrating water,
Gliding up the stairway, white,
Velvet-masked,--the count’s own daughter!

Quick I met her: whispered, “Flora,
Gaston.--_Mia_, till they go,
One brief moment here, Siora.--
She’ll perceive us--she, below,
See! the duchess’ diamonds sparkling
Round the inviolable glow
Of her throat--there, dimly darkling:

“That’s Viola!” ... Thus I drew her
In the church’s ancient pile--
Under her black mask I knew her,
By her chin, her lips, her smile.
Through one marble-foliated
Window fell the moon-rays. While
All the maskers passed we waited.

I had drawn the dagger. Turning
Called her by her name. Some lie
Of a passion sighed, her burning
Hand in mine; when, stalking by,
In the square, _his_ form bejeweled
Gleamed. My very blood burned dry
With the hate his presence fueled.

Our revenge! up-pushing slightly
Cowl, the mask fell, and revealed
Balka, as the poniard whitely
Flashed. The hollow nave re-pealed
One long shriek the loft repeated.
Swift, I stabbed her thrice. She reeled
Dead. I thought of you, the heated

Horror on my hands; and tarried
Still as silence. Drawn aside
On her face the mask hung, married
To its camphor-pallor: wide
Eyes with terror--stone. One second
I regretted; then defied
All remorse. Your promise beckoned;

And I left her. Love had pointed
Me this way. I walked the way
Clear-eyed and ... it has anointed
Us fast lovers?--Do not say,
Now, that you will go and nun it!
For this man who scorned you?--Nay!--
Live to hate him! You ’ve begun it.

CARMEN

_La Gitanilla_, tall dragoons
In Andalusian afternoons,
With ogling eye and compliment,
Smiled on you as along you went
Some sleepy street of old Seville;
Twirled with a military skill
Moustaches; buttoned uniforms
Of Spanish yellow bowed your charms.

Proud, wicked head, and hair blue-black,
Whence the mantilla, half thrown back,
Discovered shoulders and bold breast
Bohemian brown. And you were dressed
In some short skirt of gypsy red
Of smuggled stuff; and stockings,--dead
White silk,--that, worn with many a hole,
Let the plump leg peep through; while stole,
Now in, now out, your dainty toes,
Sheathed in morocco shoes, with bows
Of scarlet ribbon.--Flirtingly
You walked by me; and I did see
Your oblique eyes, your sensuous lip
That gnawed the rose I saw you flip
At bashful José’s nose while loud
The gaunt guards laughed among the crowd.
And in your brazen chemise thrust,
Heaved with the swelling of your bust,
A bunch of white acacia blooms
Whiffed past my nostrils hot perfumes.

As in a cool _neveria_
I ate an ice with Mérimée,
Dark Carmencita, very gay
You passed, with light and lissome tread,
All holiday bedizenéd;
A new mantilla on your head:
Your crimson dress gleamed, spangled fierce;
And crescent gold, hung in your ears,
Shone, wrought Morisco; and each shoe,
Of Cordovan leather, buckled blue,
Glanced merriment; and from large arms
To well-turned ankles all your charms
Blew flutterings and glitterings
Of satin bands and beaded strings:
Around each tight arm, twisted gold
Coiled serpents, and, a single fold,
Wreathed wrists; each serpent’s jeweled head,
With rubies set, convulsive red.
In flowers and trimmings, to the jar
Of mandolin and gay guitar,
You in the grated patio
Danced: the curled coxcombs’ staring row
Rang pleased applause. I saw you dance,
With wily motion and glad glance,
Voluptuous, the wild _romalis_,
Where every movement was a kiss,
A song, a poem, interwound
With your Basque tambourine’s dull sound.
I,--as the ebon castanets
Clucked out dry time in unctuous jets,--
Saw angry José through the grate
Glare on us, a pale face of hate,
When some indecent officer
Presumed too lewdly to you there.

Some still night in Seville: the street
Candilejo: two shadows meet:
Swift sabres flash within the moon--
Clash rapidly.--A dead dragoon.

AT NINEVEH

There was a princess once, who loved the slave
Of an Assyrian king, her father; known
At Nineveh as Hadria; o’er whose grave
The sands of centuries have long been blown;
Yet sooner shall the night forget its stars
Than love her story:--How, unto his throne,
One day she came, where, with his warriors,
The King sat in his hall of audience,
’Mid pillared trophies of barbaric wars,
And, kneeling to him, asked, “O father, whence
Comes love and why?”--He, smiling on her said,--
“O Hadria, love is of the gods, and hence
Divine, is only soul-interpreted.
But why love is, ah, child, we do not know,
Unless ’t is love that gives us life when dead.”--
And then his daughter, with a face aglow
With all the love that clamored in her blood
Its sweet avowal, lifted arms of snow,
And, like Aurora’s rose, before him stood,
Saying,--“Since love is of the powers above,
I love a slave, O Asshur!--Let the good
The gods have giv’n be sanctioned.--Speak not of
Dishonor and our line’s ancestral dead!
_They_ are imperial dust. _I_ live and love.”--
Black as black storm then rose the King and said,--
A lightning gesture sweeping at her there,--
“Enough! ho, Rhana, strike me off her head!”
And at the mandate, with his limbs half bare
A slave strode forth. Majestic was his form
As some young god’s. He, gathering up her hair,
Wound it three times around his sinewy arm;
Then drew his sword. It for one moment shone
A semicircling light, and, dripping warm,
Lifting the head he stood before the throne.
Then said the despot, “By the horn of Bel!
This was no child of mine!”--Like chiseled stone
Stern stood the slave, a son of Israel.
Then striding towards the monarch, in his eye
The wrath of heaven and the hate of hell,
Shrieked, “Beast! I loved her! look on us and die!”
Swifter than fire clove him to the brain.
Then kissed her face, and, holding it on high,
Cried out, “Judge thou, O God, between us twain!”
And, fifty daggers in his heart, fell slain.

SENORITA

An agate black, her roguish eyes
Claim no proud lineage of the skies,
No starry blue; but of good earth
The reckless witchery and mirth.

Looped in her raven hair’s repose,
A hot aroma, one red rose
Droops; envious of that loveliness,
Through being near which, its is less.

Twin sea-shells hung with pearls, her ears;
Whose delicate rosiness appears
Part of the pearls; whose pallid fire
Binds the attention these inspire.

One slim hand crumples up the lace
About her bosom’s swelling grace;
A ruby at her samite throat
Lends the required color-note.

The moon brings up the violet night
An urn of pearly-chaliced light;
And from the dark-railed balcony
She stoops and waves her fan at me.

O’er orange blossoms and the rose
Vague, odorous lips the South Wind blows,
Peopling the night with whispers of
Romance and palely passionate love.

And now she speaks; and seems to reach
My soul like song that learned its speech
From some dim instrument--who knows?--
Or flow’r, a dulcimer or rose.

SINCE THEN

I found myself among the trees
What time the reapers ceased to reap;
And in the sunflower-blooms the bees
Huddled brown heads and went to sleep,
Rocked by the balsam-breathing breeze.

I saw the red fox leave his lair,
A shaggy shadow, on the knoll;
And, tunnelling his thoroughfare
Beneath the soil, I watched the mole--
Stealth’s own self could not take more care.

I heard the death-moth tick and stir,
Slow-honeycombing through the bark;
I heard the cricket’s drowsy chirr,
And one lone beetle burr the dark--
The sleeping woodland seemed to purr.

And then the moon rose: and a white
Low bough of blossoms--grown almost
Where, ere you died, ’t was our delight
To tryst,--dear heart!--I thought your ghost:
--The wood is haunted since that night.

AFTER DEATH

At moonset, when ghost speaks with ghost
And spirits meet where once they sinned,
Between the whispering wood and coast,
My soul met her soul on the wind,
My late-lost Evalind.

I kissed her mouth. Her face was wild.
Two burning shadows were her eyes,
Wherein the love,--that once had smiled
A heartbreak smile,--in some strange wise,
I did not recognize.

Then suddenly I seemed to see
How sin had damned my soul and doomed
To wander thus eternally
With love and loathing, that assumed
The form of her entombed.

THE OLD MAN DREAMS

The blackened walnut in its spicy hull
Rots where it fell;
And, in the orchard, where the trees stand full,
The pear’s brown bell
Drops; and the log-house in the bramble lane,
From whose low door
Stretch yellowing acres of the corn and cane,
He sees once more.

The cat-bird sings upon its porch of pine;
And o’er its gate,
All slender-podded, twists the trumpet-vine
Its leafy weight:
And in the woodland, by the spring, mayhap,
With eyes of joy
Again he bends to set a rabbit-trap,
A brown-faced boy.

Then, whistling, through the underwoods he goes,
Out of the wood,
Where, with young cheeks, red as an autumn rose,
In gingham hood,
His sweetheart waits, her school-books on her arm:
And now it seems
Beside his chair bends down his wife’s fair form--
The old man dreams.

MEMORIES

Here where Love lies perishéd,
Look not in upon the dead,
Lest the shadowy curtains, shaken
In my Heart’s dark chamber, waken
Ghosts, beneath whose garb of sorrow
Whilom gladness bows his head:
When you come at morn, to-morrow,
Look not in upon the dead,
Here where Love lies perishéd.

Here where Love lies cold interred,
Let no syllable be heard,
Lest the hollow echoes, housing
In my Soul’s deep tomb, arousing
Wake a voice of woe, once laughter
Claimed and clothed in joy’s own word:
When you come at dusk, or after,
Let no syllable be heard,
Here where Love lies cold interred.

MARCH AND MAY

Windy the sky and mad;
Surly the gray March day;
Bleak the forests and sad,--
Oh, that it only were May!

On maples, tasseled with red,
No blithe bird, fluting, swung;
The brook, in its swollen bed,
Raved on in an unknown tongue.

We walked in the wind-tossed wood:
Her face as the May’s was fair;
Her blood was the May’s own blood;
And May’s her radiant hair.

And we found in the woodland wild
One cowering violet,
Like a frail and timorous child,
In the caked leaves bowed and wet.

And I said, “We have walked in vain!
To find but this shivering bud,
Weighed down with its weight of rain,
Crouched here in the wild March wood.”

But she said, “Though the day be sad,
And the skies be dark with fate,
There is always something glad
That will help our hearts to wait.

“Look, now, at this beautiful thing,
In this wood’s wild hollow curled!
’Tis a promise of joy and spring,
And of love, to the waiting world.

“Ah, the sinless Earth is fair,
And man’s are the sin and the gloom--
Come, bury the days that were,
And look to’ard the days to come!”

* * * * *

And the May came on with her charms,
With twinkle and rustle of feet;
Blooms stormed from her luminous arms
And songs that were wildly sweet.

Now I think of her words that day,
This day that I longed so to see,
That finds her dead with the May,
And my life but a withered tree.

IN AUTUMN

I

Sunflowers wither and lilies die,
Poppies are pods of seeds;
The first red leaves on the pathway lie,
Like blood of a heart that bleeds.

Weary alway will it be to-day,
Weary and wan and wet;
Dawn and noon will the clouds hang gray,
And the autumn wind will sigh and say,
“He comes not yet, not yet,
Weary alway, alway!”

II

Hollyhocks bend all tattered and torn,
Marigolds all are gone;
The last pale rose lies all forlorn,
Like love that is trampled on.

Weary, ah me! to-night will be,
Weary and wild and hoar;
Rain and mist will blow from the sea,
And the wind will sob in the autumn tree,
“He comes no more, no more.
Weary, ah me! ah me!”

“WHEN SHE DRAWS NEAR”

I

When she draws near,
I seem to hear
The shy approach of some wild innocence:
As if--in acorn crown--
A dryad should step down
From some dim oak-tree where the woods are dense.

II

When she’s with me,
I seem to see
The brambles blossom where just touched her dress:
As, with her love’s perfume,
She touches into bloom
The thorns of life and gives them loveliness.

REED CALL FOR APRIL

I

When April comes, and pelts with buds
And apple-blooms each orchard space,
And takes the dogwood-whitened woods
With rain and sunshine of her moods,
Like your fair face, like your sweet face:

It’s honey for the bud and dew,
And honey for the heart!
And, oh, to be away with you
Beyond the town and mart.

II

When April comes and tints the hills
With gold and beryl that rejoice,
And from her airy apron spills
The laughter of the winds and rills,
Like your young voice, like your sweet voice:

It’s gladness for God’s bending blue,
And gladness for the heart!
And, oh, to be away with you
Beyond the town and mart.

III

When April comes, and binds and girds
The world with warmth that breathes above,
And to the breeze flings all her birds,
Whose songs are welcome as the words
Of you I love, O you I love:

It’s music for all things that woo,
And music for the heart!
And, oh, to be away with you
Beyond the town and mart.

HER VIOLIN

I

Her violin!--Again begin
The dream-notes of her violin;
And tall and fair, with gold-brown hair,
I seem to see her standing there,
Soft-eyed and sweetly slender:
The room again, with strain on strain,
Vibrates to Love’s melodious pain,
As, sloping slow, is poised her bow,
While round her form the golden glow
Of sunset spills its splendor.

II

Her violin!--Now deep, now thin,
Again I hear her violin;
And, dream by dream, again I seem
To see the love-light’s tender gleam
Beneath her eyes’ long lashes:
While to my heart she seems a part
Of her pure song’s inspired art;
And, as she plays, the rosy grays
Of twilight halo hair and face,
While sunset burns to ashes.

III

O violin!--Cease, cease within
My soul, O haunting violin!
In vain, in vain, you bring again,
Back from the past, the blissful pain
Of all the love then spoken;
When on my breast, at happy rest,
A sunny while her head was pressed--
Peace, peace to these wild memories!
For, like my heart naught remedies,
Her violin lies broken.

MEETING IN SUMMER

A tranquil bar
Of rosy twilight under dusk’s first star.

A glimmering sound
Of whispering waters over grassy ground.

A sun-sweet smell
Of fresh-reaped hay from dewy field and dell.

A lazy breeze
Jostling the ripeness from the apple-trees.

A vibrant cry,
Passing, then gone, of bullbats in the sky.

And faintly now
The katydid upon the shadowy bough.

And far off then
The little owl within the lonely glen.

And soon, full soon,
The silvery arrival of the moon.

And, to your door,
The path of roses I have trod before.

And, sweetheart, you!
Among the roses and the moonlit dew.

HER VIVIEN EYES

Her Vivien eyes,--beware! beware!--
Though they be stars, a deadly snare
They set beneath her night of hair.
Regard them not! lest, drawing near--
As sages once in old Chaldee--
Thou shouldst become a worshiper,
And they thy evil destiny.

Her Vivien eyes,--away! away!--
Though they be springs, remorseless they
Gleam underneath her brow’s bright day.
Turn, turn aside, whate’er the cost!
Lest in their deeps thou lures behold,
Through which thy captive soul were lost,
As was young Hylas once of old.

Her Vivien eyes,--take heed! take heed!--
Though they be bibles, none may read
Therein of God or Holy Creed.
Look, look away! lest thou be cursed,--
As Merlin was, romances tell,--
And in their sorcerous spells immersed,
Hoping for Heaven thou chance on Hell.

I look into thy heart and then I know
The wondrous poetry of the long-ago

Page 496
_Reasons_]

REASONS

I

Yea, why I love thee let my heart repeat:
I look upon thy face and then divine
How men could die for beauty, such as thine,--
Deeming it sweet
To lay my life and manhood at thy feet,
And for a word, a glance,
Do deeds of old romance.

II

Yea, why I love thee let my heart unfold:
I look into thy heart and then I know
The wondrous poetry of the long-ago,
The Age of Gold,
That speaks strange music, that is old, so old,
Yet young, as when ’t was born,
With all the youth of morn.

III

Yea, why I love thee let my heart conclude:
I look into thy soul and realize
The undiscovered meaning of the skies,--
That long have wooed
The world with far ideals that elude,--
Out of whose dreams, maybe,
God shapes reality.

HER VESPER SONG

The summer lightning comes and goes
In one white cloud above the hill,
As if within its soft repose
A burning heart were never still--
As in my bosom pulses beat
Before the coming of his feet.

All drugged with odorous sleep, the rose
Breathes dewy balm about the place,
As if the dreams the garden knows
Arose, in immaterial grace--
As in my heart sweet thoughts arise
Beneath the ardour of his eyes.

The moon above the darkness shows
An orb of silvery snow and fire,
As if the night would now disclose
To heav’n her one divine desire--
As in the rapture of his kiss
All my glad soul is drawn to his.

The cloud divines not that it glows;
The rose knows nothing of its scent;
Nor knows the moon that it bestows
Light on our earth and firmament--
So is the soul unconscious of
The beauties it reveals through love.

THE GLORY AND THE DREAM

There in the past I see her as of old,
Blue-eyed and hazel-haired, within a room
Dim with a twilight of tenebrious gold;
Her white face sensuous as a delicate bloom
Night opens in the tropics. Fold on fold
Pale laces drape her; and a frail perfume,
As of a moonlit lily brimmed with rain,
Breathes from her presence, drowsing heart and brain.

Her head is bent; some red carnations glow
Deep in her heavy hair; her large eyes gleam;--
Bright sister stars of those twin worlds of snow,
Her breasts, through which the veinéd violets stream.--
I hold her hand; her smile comes sweetly slow
As thoughts of love that haunt a poet’s dream:
And at her feet once more I sit and hear
Wild words of passion--dead this many a year.

SNOW AND FIRE

Deep-hearted roses of the purple dusk
And lilies of the morn;
And cactus, holding up a slender tusk
Of fragrance on a thorn;
All heavy flowers, sultry with their musk,
Her presence puts to scorn.

For she is like the pale, pale snowdrop there,
Scentless and chaste of heart;
The moonflower, making spiritual the air,
Like some pure work of art;
Divine and holy, exquisitely fair,
And virtue’s counterpart.

Yet when her eyes gaze into mine, and when
Her lips to mine are pressed,--
Why are my veins all fire then? and then
Why should her soul suggest
Voluptuous perfumes, maddening unto men,
And prurient with unrest?

IN MAY

I

When you and I in the hills went Maying,
You and I in the bright May weather,
The birds, that sang on the boughs together,
There in the green of the woods, kept saying
All that my heart was saying low,
“I love you! love you!” soft and low;--
And did you know?
When you and I in the hills went Maying.

II

There where the brook on its rocks went winking,
There by its banks where the May had led us,
Flowers, that bloomed in the woods and meadows,
Azure and gold at our feet, kept thinking
All that my soul was thinking there,
“I love you! love you!” softly there;--
And did you care?
There where the brook on its rocks went winking.

III

Whatever befalls through fate’s compelling,
Should our paths unite or our pathways sever,
In the Mays to-come I shall feel forever
The wildflowers thinking, the wild-birds telling,
In words as soft as the falling dew,
The love that I keep here still for you,
As deep and true,
Whatever befalls through fate’s compelling.

“WERE I AN ARTIST”

Were I an artist, Lydia, I
Would paint you as you merit,
Not as my eyes, but dreams descry;
Not in the flesh, but spirit.

The canvas I would paint you on
Should be a strip of heaven;
My brush, a sunbeam; pigments, dawn
And night and starry even.

Your form and features to express
Likewise your soul’s chaste whiteness,
I’d take the primal essences
Of darkness and of brightness.

I’d take pure night to paint your hair;
Stars for your eyes; and morning
To paint your skin--the rosy air
Which is your limbs’ adorning.

To paint the love-bows of your lips,
I’d mix, for colors, kisses;
And for your breasts and finger-tips,
Sweet odors and soft blisses.

And to complete the picture well,
I’d temper all with woman,--
Some tears, some laughter; heaven and hell,
To show you yet are human.

THE RIDE

She rode o’er hill, she rode o’er plain,
She rode by fields of barley,
By morning-glories filled with rain,
Along the wood-side gnarly.

She rode o’er plain, she rode o’er hill,
By orchard land and berry;
Her eyes were sparkling as the rill,
Cheeks, redder than the cherry.

A bird sang here, a bird sang there,
Then blithely sang together;
Sang sudden greeting everywhere,
“Good-morrow!” and “Good weather!”

The sunlight’s laughing radiance
Laughed in her radiant tresses;
The bold breeze made her wild curls dance,
And flushed her face with kisses.

“Why ride you here, why ride you there,
Why ride you here so merry?
The sunlight living in your hair,
And in your cheek the berry?

“Why ride you with your sea-green plumes,
Your sea-green silken habit,
By balmy bosks of faint perfumes,
And haunts of roe and rabbit?”

“The morning ploughed the east with gold,
And planted it with holly;
And I was young and he was old,
And rich, and melancholy.

“A wife they ’d have me to his bed,
And to the church they hurried;
But now, gramercy! he is dead!
Thank God! is dead and buried.

“I ride by tree, I ride by rill,
I ride by rye and clover,
For by the church beyond the hill
Awaits my first true lover.”

AT PARTING

What is there left for us to say,
Now it is time to speak good-by?
And all our dreams of yesterday
Are one with yester-evening’s sky--
What is there left for us to say,
Now different ways before us lie?

A word of hope, a word of cheer,
A word of love, whose help shall last,
When we are far to bring us near
Through memories of the happy past;
A word of hope, a word of cheer,
To keep our young hearts true and fast.

What is there left for us to do,
Now it is time to say farewell?
And care, that bade us once adieu,
Returns again with us to dwell--
What is there left for us to do,
Now different ways our fates compel?

Clasp hands and kiss, touch lips and smile,
And look the love that shall remain--
When severed so by many a mile--
The sweetest balm for bitterest pain:
Clasp hands and kiss, touch lips and smile,
And trust to God to meet again.

IN THE GARDEN OF GIRLS

Serious, but smiling, stately and serene,
And lovelier than a flower,
She stands; in whom all sympathies convene
As perfumes in a bower;
Through whom I feel what soul and heart must mean,
And all their love and power.

Eyes, that commune with the frank skies of truth,
Beneath their cloud-like curls;
Lips of immortal rose, where joy and youth
Nestle like priceless pearls;
Hair, that suggests the Bible braids of Ruth,
Deeper than any girl’s.

When first I saw her, ’t was as if within
My gaze took shape some song--
Played by a master of the violin--
A music, pure and strong,
That rapt my soul above all earthly sin
To heights that know no wrong.

“COME TO THE HILLS”

Come to the hills, the woods are green--
The heart is high when lovers meet--
There is a brook that flows between
Mossed rocks where we will make our seat,
Where we will sit and speak unseen.

I hear you laughing in the lane--
The heart is high when lovers meet--
The clover smells of sun and rain
And spreads a carpet for our feet,
Where we will walk and dream again.

Come to the woods, the dusk is here--
The heart is high when lovers meet--
A bird upon the branches near
Sets music to our hearts’ sweet beat,
Our hearts that beat with something dear.

I hear your step; the lane is passed--
The heart is high when lovers meet--
The little stars come bright and fast,
Like happy eyes that watch us, Sweet,
That see us greet and kiss at last.

EVASION

I

Why do I love you, who have never given
My heart encouragement or any cause?
Is it because, as earth is held of heaven,
Your soul holds mine by some mysterious laws?
Perhaps, unseen of me, within your eyes
The answer lies.

II

From your sweet lips no word hath ever fallen
To tell my heart its love is not in vain--
The bee that woos the flow’r hath honey and pollen
To cheer him on and bring him back again:
But what have I, your other friends above,
To feed my love?

III

Still, still you are my dream and my desire;
Your love is an allurement and a dare
Set for attainment, like a shining spire,
Far, far above me in the starry air:
And gazing upward, ’gainst the hope of hope,
I breast the slope.

WILL YOU FORGET?

In years to come, will you forget,
Dear girl, how often we have met?
And I have gazed into your eyes
And there beheld no sad regret
To cloud the gladness of their skies,
While in your heart--unheard as yet--
Love slept, oblivious of my sighs?--
In years to come, will you forget?

Ah, me! I only pray that when,
In other days, some man of men
Has taught those eyes to laugh and weep
With joy and sorrow, hearts must ken
When love awakens in their deep,--
I only pray some memory then,
Or sad or sweet, you still will keep
Of me and love that might have been.

CONTRASTS

No eve of summer ever can attain
The gladness of that eve of late July,
When ’mid the roses, dripping with the rain,
Against the wondrous topaz of the sky,
I met you, leaning on the pasture bars,--
While heaven and earth grew conscious of the stars.

No night of blackest winter can repeat
The bitterness of that December night,
When, at your gate, gray-glittering with sleet,
Within the glimmering square of window-light,
We parted,--long you clung unto my arm,--
While heaven and earth surrendered to the storm.

CARISSIMA MEA

I look upon my sweetheart’s face,
And, in the world about me, see
No face like hers in any place.

It is not made, as others sing
Of their young loves, like ivory,
But like a wild-rose in the spring.

Her brow is low and very fair,
And o’er it, smooth and shadowy,
Lies deep the darkness of her hair.

Beneath her brows her eyes gleam gray,
And gaze out glad and fearlessly--
Their wonder haunts me night and day.

Her eyebrows, arched and delicate,--
Twin curves of penciled ebony,--
Within their spans contain my fate.

Her mouth, that was for kisses curved,--
So small and sweet!--it well may be
That it for me is yet reserved.

Between her hair and rounded chin,
Calm with her soul’s calm purity,
There lies no shadow of a sin.

Of perfect form, she is not tall,--
Just higher than the heart of me,
O’er which I place her, all in all.

She is not shaped, as some have sung
Of their young loves, like some slim tree,
But like the moon when it is young.

Her hands, that smell of violet,
So white and fashioned fragrantly,
Have woven round my heart a net.

Yea, I have loved her many a day;
And though for me she may not be,
Still at her feet my love I lay.

Albeit she be not for me,
God send her grace and grant that she
Know naught of sorrow all her days,
And help me still to sing her praise!

AN AUTUMN NIGHT

Some things are good on autumn nights,
When with the storm the forest fights,
And in the room the heaped hearth lights
Old-fashioned press and rafter:
Plump chestnuts hissing in the heat,
A mug of cider, sharp and sweet,
And at your side a face petite,
With lips of laughter.

Upon the roof the rolling rain,
And, tapping at the window-pane,
The wind that seems a witch’s cane
That summons spells together:
A hand within your own a while;
A mouth reflecting back your smile;
And eyes, two stars, whose beams exile
All thoughts of weather.

And, while the wind lulls, still to sit
And watch her fire-lit needles flit
A-knitting, and to feel her knit
Your very heart-strings in it:
Then, when the old clock ticks “’t is late,”
To rise, and at the door to wait
Two words, or, at the garden-gate,
A kissing minute.

A DAUGHTER OF THE STATES

She has the eyes of some barbarian Queen
Leading her wild tribes into battle; eyes,
Wherein th’ unconquerable soul defies,
And Love sits throned, imperious and serene.

And I have thought that Liberty, alone
Among her mountain stars, might look like her,
Kneeling to God, her only emperor,
Kindling her torch on Freedom’s altar-stone.

For in her self, regal with riches of
Beauty and youth, again those Queens seem born--
Boadicea, meeting scorn with scorn,
And Ermengarde, returning love for love.

THE QUARREL

An instant only and her eyes
Flashed lightning like the angry skies;

And o’er her forehead, curving down,
Fell dark the shadow of a frown;

Then backward, deep and stormy fair,
She tossed the tempest of her hair;

Then of her lips’ full rose disdain
Made a pink-folded bud again;

Then quicker than all utterance,
All changed: and at a word, a glance,

Her anger rained its tears, then passed;
And she was in my arms at last;

The austere woman, doubly dear,
And lovelier for each falling tear:

But why we quarreled, how it grew,
I can not tell, I never knew:

Perhaps ’t was Love; he, who, with tears,
Would show how fair a face appears;

As, after storm, the sky ’s more blue,
A wildflower ’s fairer for the dew.

MIRIAM

What better praise for all her ways
Than that all days her ways illume?
Such brightness as the maiden year
Knows, when God’s kindness seems as near
As flowers whose wisdom ’s but to bloom.

Hers the deep hair: a face more fair
Than roses June sets blossoming:
The sunshine of her gladness gleams
In bloom-bright lips and cheeks, and dreams
Upon her throat’s soft coloring.

Her voice is sweet as birds that greet
With song the coming of the light:
The serious happy gleam that lies
In the dark lustre of her eyes
Is as the starlight to the night.

Beyond the sea such girls as she
It was whom Titian loved to paint,
With calm Madonna eyes, and hair
Rich auburn; robed in gold and vair,
Fair as the vision of a saint.

THE SUMMER SEA

Over the summer sea,
When the white-eyed stars look pale,
And the moonbeams make a trail
Of gold through the waves for me,
I turn my ghostly sail
Away, away,
And follow the form I see
Over the summer sea.

Over the misty sea,
Ere the cliff which highest soars
From the billow-beaten shores
Reddens all rosily,
Where the witch-white water roars,
Far on, far on.
Through the foam she beckons me
Over the summer sea.

Over the haunted sea,
When the great, gold moon low lies
On the rim of the western skies,
’Twixt the moon, she comes, and me,
And gazes in my eyes;
Low down, low down,
’Twixt the orbéd moon and me,
Over the summer sea.

Deep in the bitter sea,
Wilt thou drag me down, O sweet?
Down, down! from hair to feet
Filled with thee utterly?
Against thy heart’s wild beat?--
At last! at last!
Wilt drag me down with thee,
Deep in the summer sea?

FINALE

So let it be. Thou dare not say ’t was I!--
Here in life’s temple, where thy soul can see,
Look where the beauty of our love doth lie,
Shattered in shards, a dead divinity!--
Approach: kneel down: yea, render up one sigh!
This is the end. What need to tell it thee!
So let it be.

So let it be. Care, who hath stood with him,
And sorrow, who sat by him deified,--
For whom his face made comfort,--lo! how dim
They heap his altar which they can not hide,
While memory’s lamp swings o’er it, burning slim.--
This is the end. What shall be said beside?
So let it be.