Chapter I: Front Matter

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THE TRIUMPH OF MUSIC

And Other Lyrics.

by

MADISON J. CAWEIN.

"THE OAT IS HEARD ABOVE THE LYRE."--_Swinburne._

[LIMITED.]

John P. Morton and Company. 1888

INSCRIBED

TO

WILLIAM DEAN HOWELLS

WITH

FRIENDSHIP AND ESTEEM.

COPYRIGHT 1888 BY M. J. CAWEIN.

CONTENTS.

PAGE.

The Triumph of Music, 1

What You Will, 10

In the South, 12

Pan, 15

Pax Vobiscum, 18

Mirabile Dictu, 20

Questionings, 22

Waiting, 23

In Late Fall, 26

Midwinter, 27

Longing, 28

In Middle Spring, 29

Tyranny, 31

Visions, 32

The Old Byway, 34

Diurnal, 36

The Wood Path, 38

Deficiency, 40

He Who Loves, 42

The Monastery Croft, 43

The Dryad, 44

"The Sweet o' the Year," 46

With the Seasons, 48

Unattainable, 51

Beyond, 53

Shadows, 56

Check and Counter-Check, 58

Semper Idem, 60

Two Lives, 62

Forevermore, 64

A Blown Rose, 68

To-morrow, 69

Mnemosyne, 69

The Sirens, 70

The Vintager, 71

A Stormy Sunset, 72

On a Dial, 73

Unutterable, 74

Midsummer, 75

A Fairy Cavalier, 78

The Farmstead, 80

Five Fancies: _I. The Gladiolas_, 87
_II. The Morning-Glories_, 88
_III. The Tiger-Lily_, 89
_IV. Vengeance_, 90
_V. A Dead Lily_, 92

My Suit, 94

The Family Burying-Ground, 96
The Water-Maid, 98

The Sea-King, 100

Where and What? 103

The Spring, 107

Lillita, 109

Artemis, 112

In November, 116

A Character, 117

A Mood, 120

A Thought, 122

Song, 123

Face to Face, 125

The Changeling, 130

St. John's Eve, 133

Lalage, 137

Miriam, 144

The Wind, 146

Music, 149

To ----, 153

Yule, 155

The Troubadour, 160

Why? 165

From Unbelief to Belief, 166

The King, 169

THE TRIUMPH OF MUSIC.

I

There lay in a vale 'twixt lone mountains
A garden entangled with flowers,
Where the whisper of echoing fountains
Stirred softly the musk-breathing bowers.
Where torrents cast down from rock-masses,
From caverns of red-granite steeps,
With thunders sonorous clove passes
And maddened dark gulfs with rash leaps,
With the dolorous foam of their leaps.

II

And, oh, when the sunrays came heaping
The foam of those musical chasms,
With a scintillant dust as of diamonds,
It seemed that white spirits were sweeping
Down, down thro' those voluble chasms,
Wild weeping in resonant spasms.
And the wave from the red-hearted granite
In veins rolled tumbling around;
Meandered thro' shade-haunted forests
Where many rock barriers did span it
To dash it in froth and in sound:
Where the nights with their great moons could wan it,
Or star its dusk stillness profound.

III

And here in the night would I wander
On woodways where fragrances kissed,
By shadows where murmurings kissed;
And here would I tarry to ponder
When the moon in blue vales made a mist;
Dim in forests of rank, rocking cedars,
Whose wildness made glad with their scent,
Whose boughs in the tempests were bent
Like the pennons and plumes of fierce leaders,
In the battle all ragged and rent.

IV

And so when the moonshine was floating
Far up on the mountain's bleak head,
On the uttermost foam of the torrent,
Would I string a wild harp while was gloating
The moon on my blossomy bed.
Or I lay where a fountain of blossoms
Rained rustling from arches aloft,
From the thick-scented arbors aloft,
And I sang as the blossoms' white bosoms
Pressed silk-smooth to mine and lay soft:
I sang as their redolence stung me,
And laughed on my blossomy couch,
Till the fragrance and music had flung me
Into shadows of sleep with their touch,
The magic of exquisite touch....

V

One night as I wondered and wandered
In this my rare Aidenn of flowers,
I saw where I lingered and pondered
A youth cast asleep mid the bowers:
A youth on a mantle of satin,
A poppy-red robe in the flowers.

VI

So I kissed his thin eyelids full tender,
I kissed his high forehead and pale,
I sighed as I kissed his black splendor
Of curls that were kissed of the gale,
That were moved of the balm-breathing gale.
And he woke and cried out as if haunted:--
"Oh God! for one note of that song!
For a sob of that languishing song!
Whose tumult of sorrow enchanted,
And swept my weak spirit along!"

VII

Than I sate me upon the red satin
And plunged a long look in his eyes;
I bowed on the weft of red satin
And kindled his love with my sighs.
With fingers of lightness set sobbing
The chords of my harp in a song,
Till I found that my heart was a-throbbing
And sobbing to sing like a tongue,
Was sobbing to mix with the song.

VIII

Then he cried, and his dark eyes keen glistened,
"Lost! lost! for that perilous music!
Oh God! for that tyrannous strain!
To which in my dreams I have listened,
Ah, wretch! I have listened with pain!"
And he tost on the garment of satin
His deep raven darkness of hair,
And the song at my lips was ungathered,
And I sate there to marvel and stare.