ANOTHER
A creature plucked at me in the street
But well I knew the reason why
The red stars sickened in the sky
And Hell gaped open at my feet!
IMPRESSIONS
This is the Gate of the Gray City—wrought
With piled roofs and steeples dimly seen
Thru the gray dusk—pale, wistful flakes of fire
Kindled about its lower fringe—vast murk—
A snuffling monster with an evil eye
That surly pants to work some will unknown,
Blowing white breaths—a semaphore
With lifted arm—a form that swings a light
In arcs, against infinitude of gray,
Uneasy sounds, the clink and clank and groan;
Of things inanimate—the curves of rails
In rhythmical convergence gathered up—
(And gathering up what burdens from afar!)
Monotony—monotony—despair!
This is the Gate of the Gray City.
Whatever our immitigable end,
The earth’s our home and prison thru whose windows
Our wistful scrutinizing minds traverse
The sky’s dissolving continents, exult
In melancholy mountains or, shackled,
Envy the inconstant sea that seems
An uncontaminated god, alone, complete
In mighty passion and the scorn of time.
* * *
I love the skyward-spiring tree
For its supreme unconsciousness of me.
So let us seek the lands that the Gods love,
The soil unsown, the isles of sumptuous store;
Where fallow fields yield yearly fee of grain,
And vines unpruned produce perennial bloom,
And olive slips engender faithfully,
And dark figs deck their trees; the cavernous oaks
Bleed honey’d drops, and from high hills descend
The nimble waters with melodious feet.
PRELUDE TO A PHANTASY
I will tell thee of Far-Away, of Far-Away, of Far-Away,
I will tell thee of Far-Away
The home of wandering dreams;
For they come out of Far-Away
To show us how to love and play,
And when they’ve wandered for a day
Must return, it seems.
There’s more than gold in Far-Away, in Far-Away, in Far-Away,
There’s more than gold in Far-Away,
There’s more than jewelled gleams.
There’s more than smiles in Far-Away,
And coronals of laughter gay;
There’s crystal tears that bloom alway
Beside forgotten streams.
We’ll gather gold from Far-Away, from Far-Away, from Far-Away,
We’ll gather gold from Far-Away,
We’ll steal the jewelled gleams.
We’ll hunt for smiles from Far-Away;
Following laughter by the way,
But we must for another day
Leave the tears it seems.
We’ll find the road to Far-Away, to Far-Away, to Far-Away,
We’ll know the road to Far-Away
By the feet of dreams;
For they come out of Far-Away
To love a little and to play,
And when they’ve wandered for a day
Must return it seems.
RUNNING WATER
Oh you who stand by the river in a gown of willow-green,
I will make you an eager song of my heart to-night;
I will find me a feather of a singing bird that has seen
And touched the blue targe of the sky in its flight.
I will make me a quill of it, and dip in my heart and write!
I would not make you a threnody of sorrow that has been,
For you are no more than an eager child who demand
Magical tales of me, of lacquered Arabian sheen;
I will speak very softly then with your hand
In mine, a rose petal, the things that you understand.
On the waxen and beautiful tablet that is your heart
With a singing quill and the stain of my heart I will write;
I will write with the simplest words and the simplest art
All the splendors that glow so by night—
Of the Genie and the Bottle, and carpets of orient flight.
And you who are more than a princess in your gown of yellow-green
With your bird-like and trembling heart will understand
All the luxurious sorrows and loves that have been
Written on parchment at a king’s demand—
And the simple words of them will flutter like birds in your hand.
EPITHALAMION
The pale dawn went down unto the sea,
Past the gray ships in the offing.
The salt wind found her blowing hair
And closed his wings and nested there,
And the salt sea hungered for her rare
Sweet body and forgot his scoffing.
The pale dawn went down unto the sea
When all the world was sleeping;
She lifted veils and veils of air
Until her eager limbs were bare,
And the salt sea shook his manéd hair,
And the curl’d waves came to her, leaping.
MARSH-LANDS
Sure in this spongy and luxuriant retreat—
This lovely lyric little marsh
Which nothing hath of fierce or harsh,
Unhappy fancies to evoke,
Where all life is most delicately attuned to sweet
Melodious living, here we’ll meet
Naiads dainty and discreet
With other watery folk
And watch the twinkle of their iridescent feet.
Upon a reed’s high silver point
Which early dews anoint,
The Red-wing lights and poises, swaying,
With throaty and delicious whistle playing
Pan-music in the mellow morning light.
It is like running water’s flow
A bit unearthly, and celestial quite—
A golden tremolo;
And satin robes of air half veil him from our sight.
The gay marsh-marigold
Delights its small sun to unfold;
And many a bulbous goblin thing,
Ugly and grave,
Into the dull mud burrowing
Draws from some secret treasure-cave
And to the sunlight heaves
Green breadth—great leaves
To build a vessel floating on an inland wave.
We’ll be as busy as the clouds, with naught to do,
And we will wonder at the curious striping,
In saffron glimpses, of more distant pools
Which the wind cools
With deep reflected blue.
And we will listen now to Hyla’s piping—
A thin small sprite
That one may never see
Calling to the sky his clear delight
Filled with insatiate and unbounded ecstasy.
SPRING FANCY
There is an orchard, old and rare,
(I cannot tell you where!)
With green doors opening to the sun;
And the sky-children gather there
To watch the blossoms, one by one,
Falling wistfully thru the air
From the trees’ dishevelled hair.
The sky-children shake their wings
With flutterings and gurglings—
And love the light and kiss the sun,
Nor heed the blossoms that have blown
From the fruit-wives’ ancient hair
Earthward thru the glowing air,
Wistfully—one by one.
SONG
A Flicker, a Robin, a Song-sparrow
Have come from Arcady.
The Flicker was an imp that shouted in a tree;
The Robin was a winged laugh that Spring set free;
The Song-sparrow was a liquid arrow
That pierced to the heart of me.
PLAYING
Three little girls and one little boy
Out in the first warm sunshine;
The wind blows in and the wind blows out
Voices cool as moonshine.
Six tin cans and a pile of dirt
And the air smiles like a mother—
The wind blows in and the wind blows out
As they play with each other.
Sparrows on the fence and clothes on the line
And somewhere someone’s laughter—
The wind blows in and the wind blows out
And it could not blow much softer!
Three little girls and one little boy
Out in the first warm weather—
The wind blows in and the wind blows out
While they play together.
SONG
Hi! hi! hi!
On this green morning
My soul is as taut as a greenwood-bow,
Feeling the sap in it mounting so,
Needs but a jog to loose without warning
An arrow into the infinite sky—
Hi! hi! hi!
On this green morning!
A BUST BY RODIN, KNOWN AS CERES
With rhythmic feet and garments flowing free
Draw near, draw near, bring largesse in full hand;
Move as to music of the saraband
Stately, before this Woman-deity.
Woman’s—these billows of thick hair that roll
Down the billowing breasts of her, and close
Shadows of pain and mirth in firm repose—
This delicate mask drawn tight across a soul!
A Goddess—Ultima Thule in her eye;
For the sad wisdom of its steady gaze,
Fixed on far, wintry fields and frozen ways,
Goes out to larger things than you or I:
The Titan-sap makes gods of the spring hours,
And Earth renews its children and its flowers!
THE FLOWER’S WAY
I have stood long in the night
Under a star;
I have stood still with shadowy head
And arrowy leaves outspread
Under its trembling light
Where green things are.
I have crept close to the grass
Where the beetles dart,
And the humming-bird and the dragon-fly
Were visions in the sky,
And the mendicant bees that pass
Rifled my heart.
I have lain long in the day
Under the sun,
With my burning face in the arms of the wind,
And my petals unconfin’d
And my virginal robes a-sway—
Thus joy is won!
THE TREE’S WAY
The high trees are honest folk;
They do not stand so much aloof
Up under heaven’s roof,
Altho they are earth’s fairest cloak.
Their lives are very calm and slow;
They wait for coming things to come,
They wait, they rest, they ponder some
Purpose forgotten long ago
Like quiet folk;
And sometimes I am moved to stroke
Hand-greeting as I pass them near,
And often I am sure I hear
An answer from these stately folk!
CHILDREN
What a garden of surprise
Out beyond my window lies!
Fancy, when the night is there
Gentle trees with drooping hair
Rocking, rocking cradle-wise
Little stars with yellow eyes!
VERSES TO A LITTLE CHILD
(From Hofmannsthal)
Your feet have been fashioned as roses
To seek the lands of the rainbow—
The rainbow-kingdoms are open.
There, haunting the taciturn tree-tops
Millennial prophecies linger,
The inexhaustible waters
Abide there forever and aye.
Beside the immeasurable forest
From wooden bowl brimming will you then
Apportion your milk with a hop-toad?
So festive a banqueting almost
Entices the stars to their fall!
By borders of measureless waters
Soon you will discover a playmate,
A dolphin engaging and kind.
He’ll leap to dry-land at your bidding,
And if he shall fail you sometimes
The tender, innumerable zephyrs
Will still your tempestuous sobbing.
You’ll find in the rainbow-kingdom
The ancient exalted traditions
Forever and ever unchanged.
The sun with mysterious power
Has fashioned your feet as the roses
To enter his measureless kingdom.
NIGHT-FLOWERS
This night hath no disease;
It knows not wrecks nor wars
Nor deaths of human minds.
The feet of the sweet winds
Break all the river’s peace
Into marmoreal bars.
The tops of moonlit trees
Have blossomed with white stars,
And perfumes that one finds
In old Arabian jars
Had never blooms like these!
THE NIGHT
Sorrows confide their secrets; joys lead lives
Of lonely splendor. Mankind tells all things
To me, knowing I will not ever speak.