The lost chimes, and other poems

by Gustav Melby

XII

White clover studs the velvet lawn,
And fancy forms a monument
Of marble-frieze, a tracing blent
With emerald and rosy dawn.

The carved stone is for the eye
Of passers by, who needs be told,
In characters and numbers bold,
His name; when born; when he did die.

To those who love, the strolling breeze
Is kindly whispering his name,
And who can tell from where it came,
Or whither all its music flees?

O’er those the flowers cast a spell,
The dream of a midsummer night,
And with their shapes and hues, delight
Bring forth his name in mead and dell.

And sprightly, as from Elfin coast,
There comes the boy he loved so well,
His eyes and locks and forehead tell,
He is his grandsire’s child the most.

The clover-blossoms, white as snow,
Attract his eye, as they do mine,
We gather them and lightly twine
A garland for his comely brow.

Such wreath put round his tresses dark,
Gives godlike aspect to the lad;
He laughs and runs, his heart is glad,
With gladness of a soaring lark.

I heard thee say, when life did slope:
“Man is immortal in his race;”
And now I see thee in this face,
So radiant, so full of hope.

THE FAREWELL
In Memoriam Frank J. Cressy, M. D.

’Twas here, where slopes the hill into the vale,
With many a roof and tow’r and heav’nward spire,
And rows of lofty elms,—that wan and pale
He gazed upon the sunset and its fire,
Which glowed in sky and river, on the green
And curving hills and far-off hazy plain;
The early summer was upon the scene—
All fresh and verdant after days of rain—
He looked upon it all with wistful eye,
His life’s arena ere he went to die.

What thoughts came to him then I do not know,
But seldom man was granted better place
To take farewell with everything below,
And look into the Father’s smiling face,—
For nature’s Vesper, glorious with light,
Held sweet communion with the days of yore,
And blessed the deeds of service and the right,
The things that vanish not, forevermore;
And saw he this, then had his last adieu
No painful pang, but rather, that he knew,
The morrow of that evening would be fair,
And rich in great and good realities,
Though, like all pilgrims, he wist hardly where
The homeland looms with bright felicities.

With Cato he believed “it must be so.”
That this strange sojourn is not all in vain,
And that somewhere the longing soul shall know
The meaning of the journey’s toil and pain,
And find the quest for which he daily strove,
Embodied in the light of truth and love.

He said farewell to friends of many years,
As sank the sun behind the farthest ridge,
And chilly shadows came with darksome fears
To those who homeward turned, across the bridge;
And he passed on with that which ne’er I see
Without the feeling of a mystery,—
The train of life, the unknown destiny,
The ardent hopes, the crushing misery
It bears along, as with a magic speed,—
The wonder of the age, the country’s iron-steed.

And in its speed was hope, for at the end
Stood Skill and Wisdom to prolong his life,
And with him fared a kind and trusted friend,
And more than all, his e’er devoted wife,
But Skill and Love’s most consecrated aid
Could not prolong a life—that was complete,
And like a man, the last great toll he paid,
Unfaltering, his God and Judge to meet.

But we, who took his hand upon this slope,
With parting words, have in this fitting frame
Of nature placed his life of work and hope,
And writ upon it all his honored name,
A name that lives in grateful memories
Of those to whom he gave his ministries.

BABY BRUCE

I see her kneeling at the mound
Of baby Bruce,
And placing on the turfless ground
Sweet flow’rs, profuse,
I see the pearls of bitter tears
Fall on their leaves;
Alas, that one in tender years
So sorely grieves!

Yes, he was fairer than the flow’rs
Of rarest hue,
His smile sweet as the morning hour’s
Gleam in the dew,
And as we looked into his eyes
So large and brown,
It seemed an angel from the skies
Had just come down.

What heaven gave, again it took—
Its ways are good,
But now in pity it does look
On motherhood,—
Whose love so young, so pure, so deep,
Eats sorrow’s bread,—
And whispers: “Woman do not weep,
He is not dead.”

A FUNERAL OF A CHILD ON CHRISTMAS EVE

The dusk was upon hill and wood,
Upon the fields of soft new snow,
The pine-trees in God’s acre stood,
With branches laden, bending low,
And marble shaft and monument,
Like mystic, beings draped and pale,
Seemed listening to the bells that sent
Their Christmas greeting through the vale.

Around an open, little grave
There stood a group of weeping folk;
“The Lord hath taken what he gave,
We sorrow not as without hope,
For he who gave us Christmas eve
Said: ‘Let the children come to me,
Of such the kingdom is,’ they live,
With him in joy eternally.”

Thus spake the minister of God,
But still the parent’s heart did sob,
And when they heaped the frozen clod,
He felt that heav’n his hope did rob,
Congealing tears did cease to fall,
And thicker, denser grew the gloom,
The church-bell’s clang jarred on his soul,
He wished that grave for him had room.

THE WREATH

How shall I shake off the darkness,
The nightmare that feeds on my soul?—
I looked through the windows this morning,
Upon the embankments of snow,
That ridged to the porch of my dwelling,
And covered its floor,
Where a half buried branch of an ever-green rested,
Torn from a discarded Christmas-tree,
Back of the church;—
The terrible wind of the night
Had cut it and carried it thither,
Where in the white, like a wreath it protruded its green,
A wreath for the dead,
Whose soul mid the storm of the night
Had taken its flight.—
O, God, how utterly eerie it seemed
To my mind that had worried alone
Through the vigils of night!
And on that day came the message,
That she was no more.

LINES WRITTEN ON RECEIVING NEWS OF MY FATHER’S DEATH

I sit alone in evening-gloom,
The night is cold, and shrill the wind,
I make a church out of my room,
To find some solace for the mind.

Oft have I spoken mid the throngs
Of such who pitied the bereaved,
Oft have I listened to the songs
Which other burdened hearts relieved.

But with my grief I am alone,
Far from the scene of those who weep,
Within the old ancestral home,
Beyond the ocean’s stormy deep.

I have his picture at my right,
I have it clearer in my heart,
For blurred and darkened is the sight,
And rays of mortal day depart.
* * * * * * * *
Thou wert so strong, so brave, so true,
I looked to thee, as boy and youth,
My life did take from thee its hue
In whatsoe’er it has of truth.

Thy toil, thy suffering, and love,
The love of home and native land,
So strangely clear come to me now,
Like blessings of an honest hand.

Thou saidst to me: “I will not leave
The land wherein thy mother rests;”
How could I seek thy heart to grieve
With all this new world’s varied quests?

Farewell, I may not see the place,
Where they have laid thee by her side,
But memories of vanished days,
Shall ever dear with me abide.

The distance would not let me lay
A garland on thy sable bier,
Therefore this wreath, a simple lay,
Fresh with the dew of many a tear.

I’ll weave out of my heart a wreath
Of flowers which e’er shall blossom there,—
Like those red blood-drops on the heath,
The ling which winter cannot sere.

THE GREAT STRIFE

WAR AND PROVIDENCE

Above the monster cannon’s roaring thunder,
Above the hailstorm of the musketry,
Above the shrieking shells that burst asunder,
With def’ning crash, man’s strongest masonry:
Above the tumult and the din of battle,
The loud command, the bugles’ egging call,
Above the groans of wounded and the rattle
Of death in thousand throats, above it all—

There is a hand that overrules man’s madness,
And causes ev’n his anger Him to praise,
A hand which from destruction, grief and sadness
Brings better prospects for the struggling race;
The hand of Providence which in all ages
Has shaped the history of human-kind,
And we may read upon its blood-stained pages
The loving purpose of the Father’s mind.

From Europe’s awful carnage, ruin, sorrow,
Caused by a greed insane and pride of Kings,
There will arise a brighter, better morrow
With righteousness and healing in its wings.
A day of freedom when the thrones must tumble,
A day when nations shall cast off the yoke,
When none shall batten on the poor and humble,
And untruth walk about in priestly cloak.

When Celt and Teuton, Slav and Anglo-Saxon,
Shall wisdom learn from this their plunge in gore,
And cease to spend their strength in paying tax on
Their daily bread for implements of war;
When they shall dwell in harmony as brothers,
Which is the true foundation of the world,
When good of one is good of all the others,
Then will His Kingdom’s banner be unfurled.

THE YELLOW PERIL

Written after having heard the Hon. Duncan McKinley’s lecture on “The Japanese in America.”

Whene’er the races of the East
Shall rise like floods in melting-time,
With fury of the hungry beast;
And homeless in their native clime
Shall shelter seek in this great land;
Woe then to us, if unprepared
We are the influx to withstand;
Remember Rome, and how she fared!

Her wealth and vineyards did allure
The Goth, the Vandal and the Hun,
Their hordes swooped down, while quite secure
She dwelt beneath her summer-sun;
Proud of her past and opulent
She scorned the wild advancing foe,
But found full soon her legions spent
In warding off the fatal blow.

She fell and alien nations took
The scepter from her feeble hand;
Thus written is the judgment book,
Let statesmen read and understand;
The yellow peril from the East,
From Nippon and from old Cathay
Will come unbidden to the feast,
If we neglect to guard the way.

THE VETERAN

Eighty winters have turned him white,
White of beard and of crown,
Slackened his steps and dimmed his sight,
Bent him and weighed him down,
Not only with war, but with toils of peace,
Toil of the pioneer’s life,
Now at eighty he takes his ease,
The fruit of his years is rife.

Proud he is of the things achieved,
Glad for things as they are,
Greater far than he once believed
When new was his battle-scar;
But he lives in the past, and speaks
Often of bloody frays,
Of roaring guns and shrapnel’s shrieks
In dark Rebellion days.

Bull Run, Chancellorsville, but most
Gettysburg’s three days fight,
Pickett’s charge, and the thousands lost,
Burying them in the night,
These are subjects on which he dwells,
For he himself was there.
Younger he seems while he sits and tells,
A smouldering fire seems flare.

Tales of war by a man who loves
Peace and good will among men,
Veterans pride without silken gloves,
Calling the rebel his friend,
Sighs he and says: “Oh, war is hell;
Peace is the pearl of great price,
Costlier far than mortal can tell,
Nations who keep it are wise.”

Met him I did the other day,
Reading a morning-sheet:
“Blame on the Mexicans for the way
Our Old Glory they treat,
Tearing it down from our consulate,
Trampling it in the mud,
Flag of the free must it meet such a fate,
Flag, bought with patriots’ blood!”

“Reading such things, I feel that I could
Shoulder a musket still,
Feel that my insulted country should
‘Rise in its strength with a will,
Lifting Old Glory o’er Mexico,
Ne’er to come down again,
Patriots’ fire—has it ceased to glow?—
Look to your flag, young men!”

DIES IRAE

A cry arises from the blood-soaked earth,
A cry of anguish, dying in despair,
And with hell’s horrors is the world engirt,
The prince of darkness ruleth in the air.

The gods are passing, and the kingdoms fall,
And Cosmos trembles like an autumn leaf;
What seemed the greatest sinks into the small,
And what seemed glory changes into grief.

The jewelled crowns and diadems are cast
Into the balance of the Only Just,
They are like chaff, which scattered by the blast,
Is lost, and mingles with the common dust.

The Dies Irae has arrived at last,
The books are opened by the Lamb of God,
The age of tyranny and greed is past,
He breaks oppression with His iron-rod.

And truth imprisoned, justice quite forgot,
Stand ‘for His judgment-seat in spotless white,
The earth and heaven new shall be their lot,
Upon the morn, now dawning from the night.

A MAY MORNING, 1917

From purple woods the stock-dove’s notes are flowing,
As deep and melancholy as the night,
Whose shadows from the early morning’s glowing
Now take their flight;
So sweetly clear, and gently wooing,
They bring my soul an exquisite delight.

A byre-cock’s crow comes shrilly from afar,
And wakes loud answers in the neighbor’s yard,
They greet the coming of Apollo’s car,
Like many a modern and accepted bard;
But to the woodland notes compared they are
So challenging, and hard.

The farmer rises wearily from bed,
Looks on the morn, and smiles that it is fair,
For he must toil that others may be fed,
And Providence has placed on him its care,
While others fight, and mingle with the dead,
To nourish hope and life becomes his share.

But who has eyes and ears for nature’s ways?
Who goes to matin at the stock-doves call?
When man his brother man so foully slays,
And nations into utter ruin fall;
Must war obscure the morning’s rosy rays,
And keep a May-dawn’s music from the soul?

A time like this demands the bread and meat,
But also music for the famished heart;
And we should rise the better things to greet,
Be they in nature, or in perfect art,
Lest struggling man at last must fall beneath
The load in which now all men have a part.

MY SAILOR-LAD’S LETTER

In the city of tents, by the restless sea,
My sailor-lad long has dwelt,
Since Fate has put forth her dark decree,
And strangely our children’s future is spelt,
By the horrors of things to be.

And I think, in his heart he begins to know
The meaning which glamor obscured,
For his words are like cups that overflow
With things which he has endured,
Though never just saying so.

For he is as brave, and more I ween,
Than many a fellow-lad,
And courage excels in his cheerful mien,
He even tries to make others glad,
This sailor of seventeen.

But a letter arrived, the other day,
To his little sister of seven,
To whom he wrote in a childlike way
Of things in a vision given,
And this is what he did say:—

“I stood on the shore of the moonlit lake,
Where the billows came rolling high,
The sound of the sea did my soul awake
To the breaker’s music and westwinds sigh
And to musings of my own make.”

“Methought I saw on the whitecapped waves
My dear ones come to me,—
For the heart perceives what most it craves,
On the world’s dark, turbulent sea,
The sea of clamoring waves.”

“And I saw you dance on the foamy crest,
Like a Naiad or spirit fair,
And mother and all whom I love best
Did beckon to me out there,
In the wind from the plains of the west.”

“And I called on you all by your dearest name,
As lonely I stood that night,
But none of you heard me, and none of you came,
But vanished full soon from my sight,
Like the sheen of a dying flame.”

“And it may have been the mist from the spray,
Or something like that which blurred
My eyes as I tried to look away,
And only the moan of the billows I heard,
As they came in a wild array.”

“I went to my little tent in the camp,
All cold in the April night,
My bed was cheerless and chill and damp,
And my heart was heavy as I did write,
In the light of the sky’s bright lamp.”

THE BUGLE CALL

America, awake, awake!
Put on thy armor, for the hour
Has come when Freedom is at stake!
Arise, and show thy spirit’s power,
And now, as in thy youth,
The tyrant’s shackles break;
And let the truth,
Which made thee great,
Decide the destiny of mankind
Ere ’tis too late!

To thee the world is looking for salvation;
Thou hast it. Give it in God’s name!
And it will make thee tenfold more a nation—
Withhold it, and on thee shall be the blame
Of ages—and the shame.

This is the testing-time,
Which like a fire brings forth
The people’s real worth;
For men from every clime
Is now this testing-time,
But we shall joy to see,
The gold of love is there,
For home and Liberty,
And Loyalty shall be
Their watchword everywhere.

Awake, America, awake!
The bugle-call to arms is sounding,
Thy sons are hearing it and shake
Old Glory to the winds, with faith abounding,
And ’neath this emblem of the free
A sacred pledge they make,
That it shall be
Unharmed by any foe,
And aid the world in despots’ overthrow.

They come—these lads from country-home and town,
From crowded cities and the lonely plains,
They come in blouses blue and khaki brown,
They come by thousands on the speeding trains,
To meet the hardships and the pains.

Still, thou, America, art half asleep,
Entranced by pleasant ease,
Thou dreamest yet of peace,
For it seems far across the deep,
Where death and grave a harvest reap—
It seems so far away
The nations’ judgment day,
But, like nocturnal thief,
It may bring thee to grief,—
Therefore obey the bugle-call to fight,
Arise, put on thy armor, show thy might!

July, 1917

FLAG-RAISING

No longer as an ornament,
Adoring festive places,
The flag is to the masthead sent,
Before uplifted faces,—
No longer as a children’s play
We fling it to the breezes,
With thoughtless praise on gala-days,
When each acts as he pleases.

But like a sacramental act
Its raising is attended,
When loyal hearts behold a pact
In colors sweetly blended,—
When men, responsive to its call,
Make grim determination,
That tyranny at last must fall
Before a freeborn nation.

And as it waves above their heads,
’Tis like a benediction
Which sacredness and glory sheds
On men of just conscription,—
They stand aloof, they seem apart,
Like heroes consecrated,
So true and brave, so strong of heart
To freedom dedicated.
October, 1917

THE RED CROSS
(In hoc signo vinces.)

O, crimson cross of Calvary!
O, heavenly sign of Constantine!
O, mercy-emblem of the free,
The victory must still be thine!
Thou paradox of horrid war
Shalt stand unscathed when it is o’er!

Was by this sign the pagan host
On Tiber’s banks subdued at last,
Without the reck’ning of the cost,
And all the suff’ring of the past,
How much less now should money be
The measure of its victory!

A holy emblem of the hearts
Which love and weep, and gladly give,
That each true soldier who departs
May mid the conflict hope to live,
For when he does the cross behold,
It cheers his soul and makes him bold.

Ah, let it go where’er he goes,
With all its kindly ministries!
Through this from million hearts there flows
A stream of warmest sympathies;
And must he give his all, even then,
It is to him his last true friend.

Speed on, Red Cross, thou heaven-sent,
Into the lands of pain and woe,
Until their madness shall be spent,
And thou shalt stand amid the glow
Of that new dawn of Brotherhood,
A symbol of man’s highest good!

THE DOLEFUL MOTHER OF MANKIND

“Rest, rest, perturbed Earth!
O, rest, thou doleful mother of mankind!”
Wordsworth

I have not seen thy beauty for the pall
Of horror, hanging over all the world,
I have not heard thy music for the din
Of battle-lines against each other hurled.

And now thy face is covered with a shroud
Of purest white, and thou wilt take thy rest;
The winds will sing their evening lullabies,
With memories of love and feathered nest.

And mothers, at the dusk, will list thereto,
And think of croonings in the years gone by,
When little boys sat by the window-panes,
And gazed with wonder on the moonlit sky.

And now, perchance, they lie beneath thy shroud,
Or destined soon to join the sleeping host,—
War’s sacrifice, O God, how man doth sin!
How in the utter darkness he seems lost!

How far from nature has he erred and strayed,
A prey to greed, and arrogance of kings!
Shall he at last, a prodigal, return
To dwell in peace ’neath the “Almighty’s wings?”

The doleful mother of mankind doth wait,
And when her children come, anew she dons
Her spring-attire, and smiles forgivingly,
And breathes her peace upon her weary sons.

And then again I’ll feel the throb of joy,
And glory in the wonders of thy face,
Yea, revel in thy thousand harmonies,
And wander satisfied along thy ways.

MIDWINTER’S DREAM
(1918)

Full tired of war and worry do I turn
To nature in her sweet midwinter dreams,
To purple twilights, when the day’s last beams
Like flick’ring candles on the snowdrifts burn,
While star and crescent, in the deepest blue,
Shed peace on fields and woods and frozen lakes;
And from the creeping shadows soon awakes
Life’s fairy-world, the one as boy I knew
In unfeigned joy that varied with each scene
Of winter’s whiteness, or midsummer’s green.

The dormant earth dreams of the life to be,
When spring returns to call it from the grave,
When through its breast shall rush the ardent wave
Of love and hope, and songs of ecstasy;—
But in the moonlight and the shadows dun
The dreams appear in emblems vague and frore,
Like wandering spectres from a mystic shore
Which track the glory of the setting sun
Like love, that plays behind a rosy screen,
Because ’tis yet too modest to be seen.

The winter heavy hangs on humankind—
In homes, and camps, and on the stormy seas,
On Europe’s battlefields, whose miseries
Appall with horrors every normal mind;
Its million graves, decked with the covering
Of jewelled purity, where heroes sleep,
At whose low crosses countless hearts must weep,—
Is holy ground, where life shall take its wing
To truer freedom and a larger love,
With peace on earth and good will from above.

Our country’s dream: that when the southwind’s
breath
Shall wake to life and gladness all the land,
Like risen pow’r our chosen youth shall stand
Around the flag which means the tyrant’s death,—
That like the life which quickens everything,
Our hosts from South and North and East and West
Shall fare rejoicing o’er the ocean’s crest,
And Freedom’s victory to Europe bring,—
Midwinter’s dream in every loyal heart,
Who dreams it not, in Freedom has no part.

BY THE WAYSIDE

THE CANADIAN PRAIRIES

Two hundred long miles and never a tree,
O, nothing but plains all scorched by the sun!
The buffalo’s trails one freely may see,
Which over the billowing ridges run,
And here the Indian hunted at will,
And slaughtered and wasted the bison wild,
The heaps of its bleached bones bear witness still
How wanton was he, the prairie’s child.

Yes, here is a wildness which bids my soul
To saddle my pony and ride away,
And follow its weird and mysterious call
To freedom complete, if just for a day,
To follow the paths where the bison did roam,
To list to the coyotes and prairie-dog’s bark,
But thankful at night for the lone settler’s home
And a gleam of his light in the dark.

THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS

Majesty, power, and dominion and glory,
Be unto Thee who these wonders hast wrought,
Mountain peaks lofty, all snow-capped and hoary,
Thou alone knowest their wonderful story,
When from the bowels of the earth they were brought.

Strangest formations and glaciers beaming,
Cataracts rushing from dizziest heights,
Emerald rivers with great swiftness streaming,
Crystal-clear rivulets rushing and gleaming,
Ne’er did I witness more glorious sights.

Down in the valley the flowers are growing,
Trees too, yea, forests are flourishing there,
Sweetly their fragrance on cool breezes flowing,
Terrible grandeur is meek beauty wooing,
Happy the love-pact, the harmony rare.

Thus is the image of God here reflected,
Mighty sublimity, lowliness sweet,
Happy the pilgrim who this has detected,
Travel-worn be he, yet never dejected,
Since he, O, Father, may sit at Thy feet.

MOUNT SHASTA

When from the fiery pangs of earth this queen
Of mountains was brought forth, the spirits of
The air desired to dress her in the sheen
And glory of their pure celestial love;
They gave her for a veil the fleecy cloud,
Which gently floats about her lofty brow;
They gave her for a mantle to enshroud
Her shoulders strong the ever glittering snow;
And then they called upon the fir and pine
To weave a robe of never fading green,
And with the silver stream their wool entwine,
That here and there its bright gleam might be seen;
She thus adorned has stood for eons long,
The queen among the mountains of the west,
In beauty cloth, inspiring men to song,
And lifting human thoughts to what is best.

VERSES
Written while sailing from Vancouver to Seattle.

I’ve seen the forest and mountains,
I’ve seen the far stretching plain,
But oh for a whiff of the briny sea,
And a journey across the main!

Oh, then does my soul find its pleasure,
Akin to my childhood joy,
For my home was close to the seashore,
And I lived with the fjord as a boy.

Its unbounded freedom and greatness
Created a love in my soul,
And never I sail o’er the surging sea,
But liberty’s voice does me call.

Its mystery, aye, and its music
Have followed me all the way,
And borne—as they are—by the foaming wave,
They blend in an unsung lay.

And all day long do I listen,
And all day long do I look
To freedom which never was nation’s,
To songs that were never in book.

TO AN UNKNOWN MUSICIAN

(Verses written while listening to a melody played on board the “Princess Charlotte,” sailing through the strait of Juan de Fuca)

What is nature’s charms and grandeur,
When compared to what man is,
In his sorrows and his longings,
In his triumphs and his bliss!
Oh, a soul that hath such feelings,
As the one who now doth play,
Such a depth of true emotions,
Lives in God’s eternal day!

Thou unconsciously hast moved me,
I’m a captive at thy will,
Though in thousand leagues of journey
Oft my soul has had its fill
Of the beauty of creation,
Known its raptures and delight,
Yet not once such inspiration
Has possessed me as tonight.

Play, play on thou sweet musician,
While the darkness gathers round,
While our ship is speeding onward
With a rhythmic, rushing sound,
While the stars look down upon us,
Mirrored in the tranquil sea,
Render thy interpretation
Of life’s joy and misery.

SEATTLE
(A meditation)

Thou princess of the sea, how thou hast grown,
Since last I saw thee, and how beautiful!
The ocean-breezes must to thee have blown
The ardent health which nothing wrong could dull,
The blood of races mingle in thy veins,
The spirit of two worlds have met in thee,
Most genial and free thou here dost reign,
A charming princess of the western sea.

It was with thee I did a year abide,
A year so antithetically mixed,
When painful doubts forbade me to confide,
And life’s career, confessed, still was unfixed;
May be it was thy spirit, which I felt,
That gave me song and Oriental dreams,
And when in Occidental shrines I knelt,
Of Oriental truth there came bright gleams.

And hath not doubts been harassing my soul,
And had I shunned to give a heed to fears,
But followed—like thyself—the Spirit’s call,
How different had been the lapsing years;
Perhaps I then with glory now could meet
The growth and life, I see on every hand,
But now I sit in sorrow at thy feet,
And find my name was written in the sand.

GJOA
Capt. Amundsen’s Ship in San Francisco

Within the sound of the Pacific’s roar
Stands Gjoa amid palms and myrtle trees,
Her prow is lifted toward the rocky shore,
As if impatient for the stormy seas,
The sturdy little ship of Arctic fame,
Which bears from storms and ice full many a mark,
Now like a lion in a cage, grown tame,
Stands here—a relic only—in a park.

A precious relic to Norwegian hearts,
With pride and gratitude they look on thee;
Proud that thou sailed, where man had made no charts,
The first explorer of a strait and sea,
And grateful that the land of Vikings still
Has sons of courage and adventure bold;
For Roald Amundsen forever will
Remain a man of true heroic mold.

And thou art here incaged to sniff the brine,
Forsaken by the captain and his crew,
A monument the great throngs to remind,
What talent mixed with manliness can do,
And that a nation may be small, yet great,
Be poor and still excel in noblest ken,
A silent witness at the Golden Gate;
A nation’s glory is her greatest men.

THE GRAVE IN THE DESERT

Amid the plains of yellow sand and cactus,
Encircled by the distant barren hills,
Amid the awful desert of Nevada,
Beneath the glaring sun which burns and kills,
There is a lonely grave, where the San Padro
Fast speeds from palm-groves of Los Angeles,
A lonely grave just by the road-side,
Which kindly hands unselfishly did bless.

A wooden cross is standing at its head,
On which no name nor date they did inscribe,
Still, half in ruin, it stands there to bless
An unknown sleeper of the wandering tribe.
And at the foot the symbol of his life,
No fitter epitaph on any grave—
For man is but a restless sojourner,
So there they placed the pilgrim’s handworn stave.

Who was he? None can tell, some say a tramp,
Who stole a ride and crushed was ’neath the wheels;
But tramps are also men, and sometimes more
Of worth than their unhappy plight reveals;
But this I know: He was a mother’s son,
Who still may wonder how her boy does fare,
Who still, perchance, is praying for this one,
The chiefest object of her loving care.

May be some other hearts are looking for
His coming home, though after many years,
Who think of him as he was in his youth,
And seldom speak his name, except with tears,
Who know not of this solitary grave,
Where death and weird oblivion do reign,
Where all seems hopeless, save the crumbling cross,
Which shall at last life’s mystery explain.

THE MOUNTAINS OF THE PROPHET

In the purple of the morning,
Through the dreamy haze of day spring,
Did the mountain-tops ’round Salt Lake
Loom before us, as the desert
We were leaving far behind us.
“Lofty mountains of the prophet,”
Did I mutter without thinking,
Came the words, as if repeated
After some one who knew better,
After one whose inspiration
Was from truth and heavenly wisdom;
And instinctively I pondered
That the prophet’s eyes had often
Lifted been to these blue mountains,
Whence his help should come, and glory
Of the Lord appear to Zion,
And ’mongst which the trail was winding,
Bloody trail of weary pilgrims,
Seeking an abiding city,
Guarded by their rugged fastness,
And the wide expanse of Salt Lake.

Here, where seemed but barren desert,
Did the prophet’s eye see visions
Of a city and a temple,
Where the saints should dwell in saf’ty,
Where in peace they God might worship;
And this vision, now made real,
Lends a lustre to the mountains,
Gives a romance to their valleys;
And whate’er their names may be, I
Call them mountains of the prophet.

CHICAGO

O, wonder of our age!
Consummate wonder, not of state alone, but of our land,
Unique among the cities dost thou stand
Upon the page
Of history, in youth and might!
Thou didst spring forth as in a night,
From where the redman roved
Along the dreamy shores of Michigan,
Where four-score years ago
Thy life began;
Some fairy moved
Her wand upon thee,
For like a fabled urban didst thou grow.

Colossal mart,
Of commerce, like the heart
Thou sendest out through arteries and veins
Pulsating life into the world;
Napoleons of business-brains
Are marshalling their forces,
With colors high unfurled,
Not on war-harnessed horses,
To madly fight,
To kill and blight,
But to employ each pow’r
To make thee stronger, better every newborn hour.
Thy mighty citadels of stone,
So huge, so tall,
So many and immense,
That with their burden mother earth seems groan,
Throb with a life intense,
And from thy canyons, we call streets,
Great traffic’s constant roar us meets.
Great is thy wealth,
Great is thy woe,
Less great thy health,
But great is its foe;
Within thy pale the great extremes
Of good and evil dwell:
Felicities of heavenly dreams,
And hopelessness of hell:
Above thy scum of things
The voice of heaven sings.

July, 1915

THE ISLE OF DREAMS

The island of dreams lies not far away,
Encompassed by sunlight and sea,
I happened to reach it the other day,
While breezes were playing so languidly—
My boat scarcely moved on the bay.

And this is the island I happened to find,
The isle ’mid the glittering deep:
A bower with luxuriant foliage entwined,
’Mongst rocks that are mossy and steep,
Where shadows give rest to the mind.

And here in the shade is a clear, cooling spring,
Which ceaselessly murmurs its song,
And down in a glade the brown thrushes sing,
In afternoons drowsy and long,
In hours that bear dreams on their wings;

And balm for the care-laden spirit have they,
Of duty forgetfulness sweet,
With fragrance of roses they lead you astray,
To realms of fair visions replete,
Bright visions of midsummer-day.

The fairies are here and the unreal things,
Derided by men of pure facts,
Though Science doth saunter here, sometimes she clings
To fancy’s prophetical acts,
And out of the dreamland them brings.

Yea, great things are born in this enchanted place,
Where poets do loiter and rest,
Beholding fair visions which beckon their race
To vistas more lofty and blest,
In beauty’s immaculate ways.

LAKE HARRIET

Behold the noiseless sailboat and canoe,
That slowly glide upon the glassy lake,
Which wedded seems to heaven’s lofty blue,
And every silver cloud within its wake;
The lonely youth dreams as he moves along,
And who can tell what wondrous dreams they be,
Fit theme, I ween, for any poet’s song,
Of sadness or of gladsome reverie.

There also sail the lover and his lass,
They laugh and chat, and have a gleeful time,
For them the golden moments swiftly pass,
Since they are living in life’s summer clime,
To them sweet nature’s beauty doth exist
As background only to their happiness,
And heav’n the blue-eyed Harriet has kist,
Because their own true love they dare confess.

And o’er the water strains from Lohengrin
Come floating from the Grecian-pillard stand,
And add enchantment to the charming scene,
The wedding-scene of sky and sea and land,—
The hymeneal of youth’s dreams of life,
Of hearts aglow with love’s sweet fervency,
Of thousand souls who here forget their strife,
And for an hour their wonted misery.

THE CUBIST

I wandered to-day in an institute,
A wonderful palace of art,
And this I can say in spirit and truth,
It was a delight to my heart,
To see how the masters of ages past
Have found a place in this shrine,
Till I came to a room, methinks ’twas the last,
Which the Cubist’s contortions confine.

A disgrace, I said, to allow in this place,
What lunatic homes should adorn,
An insult to art and the human race,
Of spirits degenerate born,
A meaningless daub, a horrid display
Of colors and lines and all,
But then to myself I also did say:
May be ’tis the age—and its soul.

A wicked word it was this to say,
As I left for the congested street,
And followed the masses which made their way
To a place where ten thousand did meet
Three times a day, to be edified
With burlesque, in Jesus name,
And painfully in my soul it cried:
“The Cubist again, just the same!”

I glanced at a paper at hour of sleep,
And found a whole page about bards,
Who gained a renown by a single leap,
With something which all art discards,
Again I said: ’tis the Cubist’s age,
A prophet is he after all,
Of the church and the stage and the printed page,
Of the age that has bartered its soul.

THE HANDCLASP

Full thousands of leagues over land, over seas,
I travelled, for two things to find:
From work, and its routine, a needed surcease,
And knowledge, to quicken the mind.

I moved mid the crowds in the cities of fame,
I pondered their pleasures and pride,
A stranger, alone, wherever I came,
I heard but the surge of the tide.

Though knowledge increased with the sight of the new,
Though grandeur gave thrills of delight,
Though marvelling oft at the things, man can do,
Yet weariness came with the night.

And I longed for the sound of the voice of a friend,
I longed for my home far away,
When, behold, I met one at a thoroughfare’s end,
At the close of a wearisome day!

The clasp of his hand, with the love of his heart,
The warm and the genuine grip,
Brought greater delight than the sight of all art,
And all wonderful things of the trip.

A COUNTRY STORE

Beside a winding country road
A house unique one sees,
It used to be the Lord’s abode,
Now that of groceries.

A church with graveyard in its rear,
Where many saints do sleep,
O, could they rise, I greatly fear,
It would be for to weep,

Beholding what the years have wrought
In changes of the place,
How man for gain has rudely sought
Its mem’ries to efface.

For here, where generations met
To worship God in truth,
Now Mammon has his motto set,
With Vandal hand uncouth.

Where once did sound the Holy Word,
By men of earnest heart,
Now bargainings are daily heard,—
The language of the mart.

Where once the altar stood, now stands
A stove around which sit
The gossiper’s unholy bands
And swear and lie and spit.

And could each much neglected mound
Yield up its dust to life again,
The words of Christ would then resound:
“My Father’s house ye made a den.”

But thus our sacrilegious age
Is blinded by the god of gold,
Soon finished is its sacred page,
Our days of worship well-nigh told.

SUNSETS ON CLEARWATER LAKE, MINN.
(To Mrs. A. W. W.)

First Evening

A path of trembling gold, from where I stand,
Across the limpid lake, to darkling woods,
Upon the far off strand,
Where evening’s glory broods,
Until it changes into rose,
A livid pink, suffusing all,
The mighty water’s deep repose;
And as the fiery ball
Drops into clouds on the horizon’s rim,
The hue, most delicate, takes on a crimson glow,
In which the shadows of the shore grow dim,
And slowly all things into darkness flow;
Anon the moon appears and clothes the scene
And floating mist-veil into languid sheen.

Second Evening

A sea of fire in which a sky
Of lavender and blue and red
Together with the clouds of changing dye
Reflected are—divinely wed;
And we, who rove about, are led
By an illusion, such as seldom seen:
A strange receding of the deep,
As if we sat above a waterfall,
O’er which our skiff full soon must leap
Into immensity, bright, hyaline,
Where brooding spirits beck and call.

A glorious view is heaven in the depth
Of tranquil seas, but more
Its virtues, mirrored in a human heart;
And thou, who hast its kindnesses so kept,
That changing vistas or receding shore
Can not extinguish life’s immortal part
In the abiding love divine, as clear
As all this evening glory in a glassy mere,
Art more than all what nature can express,
Whose word can cheer, whose gentle hand can bless.

Illusions!—much is but illusions:
Fear, and all the ghosts that troop with it.
The good alone, in all its sweet effusion,
Is real as the sun, by which the world is lit;
The cataract of death, the dread abyss—
Does not exist, for all the light is His.

Third Evening

To-night the rising storm-clouds hide
The sun’s departure from our gaze;
A heavy mist begins to glide
Across the water’s ashen face;
A host of swallows, circling, fly
Like cavalcades upon a plain;
A myriad of insects die,
Uncounted lives, like drops of rain
Lost in the sea, lost in the All,
The life, the death, the Oversoul.
And little children laugh and play
Upon the beach, and on the pier,
In them the closing of the day,
With gathering storm, awakes no fear,
For in their souls the light remains,
That oped the water-lily’s breast,
And woke the warbler’s glad refrain,
And all the heart of nature blest;
What matters though the clouds obscure
Its finished course one single eve,
If we, like children, can allure
Even clouds and mist to pleasure give.

Fourth Evening

The glitt’ring wavelets blind my sight,
And neath the hand I needs must scan
The dazzling shimmer of the light,
Which like Seraphic highways span
The breeze-swept, glad expanse;
Methinks I see the Naiads dance
To music of the swaying reeds
And rushes, where the narrows jut,
Adorned with many-colored weeds,
From Neptune’s gardens freshly cut.

Amid the glimmer one discerns
A boat wherein a youth doth stand,
Like Hiawatha’s passing, turn
Its prow with dreamy ease from land,
The well nigh naked youth to me
Is like a god of Grecian mould,
Whose perfect form and symmetry
Is like Apollo’s of old;
He speaks to fellows in the deep,
Whose heads move ’mid the curling gleams,
Alas, that death should ever reap
Among such scenes of pleasant dreams!

But nature always clamors for
What she hath lent to life a while,
And though we borrow more and more,
And all her powers do beguile,
Yet comes the hour on land or sea,
She asks for all with usury.

The boy lifts up his hands and dives,
A pleasant plunge that has no dread,
But I recall some precious lives,
Which thus were reckoned ’mongst the dead,
And in my heart, at end of day,
A prayer for the lads I say.

Fifth Evening

Song of the West-wind o’er the waves,
Song of the billows, as the lave
The shoreline with a mystic moan,
Song of the rushes in the shallow,
Song of the aspen tree and sallow,—
Ever as the undertone.

Song of cicadas and the cricket
From ragged grasses and the thicket,
Song of the whirring dragon-fly,
That goes to sea, but for to die,
Song of the warblers, flitting nigh,
Song of the loon’s weird, distant cry.

Song of a horn on yonder hill,
That echoes in the far away,
The tone is soft as of a rill,—
“The end of a perfect day”—
As sinks the sun, and I depart,
With all this music in my heart.

TWILIGHT

A dull, pink evening sky,
A white ridge shadow-streaked below,
The tall, dark trees near by,—
In the deep snow.

Two horses, one is white,
As white as is the new-fall’n snow,
The other black as darkest night,—
Along the highway go.

One, emblem of the parting day,
The other, of approaching night,
And o’er the hill the rosy ray
Of this one hour’s delight.

APRIL

O, I love the month of April, when the southwind gently blows,
Calling nature from its slumber, from cold winter’s long repose,
Till the meadow its awakening by a tint of verdure shows,
And the willow with bright saffron in the evening sunshine glows;

When the meadow-lark is standing on the fence-post, with its throat
Lifted up to merry lovesongs which across the prairies float;
When the robin on the house-lawn proudly stands in his red coat,
Then a-sudden makes departure with a shrill and happy note;—

When the air is full of meaning, clothed in life’s sweet mystery,
Touching all things with its magic, even with love’s ecstasy,
And you see it and you feel it, it is upon land and sea,
It is nature’s Easter dawning after drear Gethsemane.

And the children’s faces brighten, and their laughter has a ring
Which no winter-sport could give them, and no lamplight play could bring;
Even the aged in whose bosom life’s enchantments seldom sing,
Take a pleasure in the message of this happy month of spring.

Jocund April, lovely April, of all months my choice thou art,
Since in thee there is a solace for all nature’s weary heart,
And in thee there is a promise that we all shall have a part
In the hope which man professes through his worship and his art.

I’M A PART OF THE WIND AND THE CURLING WAVE

I’m a part of the wind and the curling wave,
Of the budding trees and the tender blade,
A part of the life that has burst its grave,
Of crocus and buttercup studding the glade,
Of the goose-berry bush and the shadow it throws,
Of the moss on the rocks and the slender ferns,
Of the burly weed that earliest grows,
And all that quickens and upward yearns.

I’m a part of the light, and the golden flash
Of the flicker’s wing o’er the glittering pond,
Of the sable crow in the lofty ash,
A-calling his mate in the trees beyond;
Of the dragon-fly’s gossamer wing and flight;
Of the insect just risen from winter’s sleep;
Of things that find in the sun delight,
Whether they blossom, or fly, or creep.

A part of the risen life and the all
Eternal Spirit, anew each spring,
Wherefore I follow its kindly call,
To hear the carol His angels sing,—
What saith it? O, you must hear it alone,
In the paths of the woods on an April day,
And feel, as I do, you are truly one
With nature—to fathom the glorious lay.

THE CHIPPING SPARROW

The clouds are hanging dark and low,
The budding trees are still quite bare,
And from the North the cold winds blow,
Of spring we almost might despair.

But from the branches, ashen gray,
Outside my window, comes a song,
A warbling Chipping Sparrow’s lay,
To cold and dimness nonchalant.

His music has a thrilling joy,
It warms the soul, allures a smile,
Its brooding doubts he does destroy,
And makes it happy like a child.

And now a sudden, cheering gleam
Falls on him from a rift of blue,
I see him in a golden dream,—
I know that song alone is true.

His crimson tuft a poet’s crown,
His tawny breast a badge of love,
And that clear sunray coming down,
Our Father’s watchful eye above.

IN THE LILAC-BLOSSOM-TIME

When the fragrance of the purple and lavender lilac-bloom
Meets the sweet distilled aroma from the plum and apple-trees,
And the dainty scent of violets amid the garden-gloom,
Where’s the music of the hum and drone of pollen-painted bees,
Then my soul takes up its harp, which long upon the willows hung,
And attunes it to the gladness that is floating in the air,
For it is in lilac-blossom-time that everything grows young,
And the heart of man is lighter, and has little less of care.

In the lilac-blossom-time it seems, the brown thrush blithest sings,
And the wood-dove cooes the deepest from a breast brimful with love,
And the Oriole’s glad music clearest ’mongst the branches rings,
To its mate that sits abrooding on the nest upon the bough;
And the Whip-poor-will is calling from the woodlands dark, at eve,
With a zest which makes the farmer feel that even the night hath song,
And in the cool of day he thinks, it is quite good to live,
“Since after toil I here can rest the lilac-trees among.”

In the lilac-blossom-time, methinks, are children happiest,
Since with that blossoms’ coming a great liberty draws nigh,
The days of school are over, and they feel supremely blest
In the days mid nature’s glories, ’neath the blue and open sky,
Or to lie beneath the lilacs with a story-book in hand,
Reading perfume into fancies, Puck and fairies twixt each line,
Till the heart is with them dancing in a happy wonderland,
While the shadows of the after-noon with lilac hues combine.

In the lilac-blossom-time the lovers often fondly meet,
And drink the blossom’s odor, a true potency for dreams,
And oftest when the evening-dew makes it a tenfold sweet,
A-trembling like a tear of joy within the clear moonbeam,
The youth in his new happiness a prince of kingdoms is,
The maiden is a being fair, as from some other clime,
And heaven itself is upon earth in that pure, binding kiss,
There in her father’s garden in the lilac-blossom-time.

THE RUNNEL’S DITTY

I met a runnel amid the meads,
In the evening, in the evening,
And it did ramble ’mongst rush and reeds,
In the evening, in the evening,
And I did linger to hear its song,
As it did carelessly wind along,
In the evening, in the evening.

What sang the runnel upon its way?
In the evening, in the evening;
I listened long to its happy lay,
In the evening, in the evening;
But all my musing seemed but in vain,
And all its music awoke but pain,
In the evening, in the evening.

The blooming thornapple on its bank,
Also listened, also listened,
And flags and buttercups, dewy dank,
Also listened, also listened;
And thrushes nestling in alder-trees,
Did hush their babes with its melodies,
And they listened, and they listened.

I asked the violets on its side,
In the evening, in the evening,—
If they its song would to me confide,
In the evening, in the evening;
And like some children of guileless soul
They said: “Its lay is the song of all,
In the evening, in the evening.”

“The ceaseless longing to reach the sea,
In the evening, in the evening;
The song of life and eternity,
In the evening, in the evening;
A lay of love in the early morn,
A lay of hope to the lone and lorn,—
In the evening, in the evening.”

THE CHILD AND THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN

She pored o’er the open page
Of the Gospel, according to John,
Where the Ruler did Christ engage
At hours of the silent night,
And sought for his soul that light,
Which God sent forth through His Son.

But she could not read a word,
A child of four summers she,
Not ever, even once, had she heard
That story of second birth,
Nor asked, like the wise of the earth,
“O, Lord, how can these things be?”

Her face had the glory of heaven,
The look of an angel her eye,
I said: “And to her it is given
To know, for her soul is one
With the soul of this page of John,
And the wisdom that comes from on high.”

THE BIRTHDAY CAKE

Five little candles on her birthday cake,
Five little candles brightly burning,
We gaze on them, while memories awake
Of happy moments, nevermore returning.

Five little years of childhood happiness,
Five little years, when oft we played together,
How often did her love and joy us bless,
When days seemed dark, and stormy was the
weather.

The tiny lights are dying one by one,
As one by one the years their flight have taken,
I shed a tear for that which thus is gone,
And kiss the child for whom the cake was baken.

MY GOLDFISH

Five little goldfish in a vase
My simple study-room do grace,
And oft when tired of reading books,
I turn to them my weary looks,
And pleasure find in their quaint ways,
Reminding me of ancient lays.

Amid the deep, on sparkling sands,
A tow’ring Gothic castle stands,
Its gates and windows open wide,
Through which the lustrous carplings glide,
Like sea-nymphs in the days of old,
Like mermaids in an age of gold.

They hide beneath the dark green weed,
And fondly on its frondlets feed,
It seems an island near the shore,
Where Lorelei did sing of yore,
And gold and green most softly blend,
As then—ere romance had an end.

O, days of legendary lore,
Of fairy-folk and nymphs galore!
When tired of this prosaic age,
And weary of the modern page,
I find my golden fish suggest
The dreams with which your life was blest.