AN UNFINISHED PROPHECY
I
THE twilight land toyed with the night
When from the hills with footsteps light
An Indian maiden passed adown
A rugged path o'er boulders brown
Unto the soft gray river sand.
The sweet balsamic breezes fanned
Her bronze-brown cheeks and blue-black hair
With loving wings, and lilies fair
Held up their golden cups to stay
The progress of her paddle's play,
As o'er the quivering ripplets she,
With airy grace and gestures free,
Pulled from the beach a bark canoe,
And threaded reedy mazes through
Toward the river's open breast,
That reached away into the west
Till it caressed the after-glow
Of sunset in the distance low.
II
The river's rippling monotone—
The low-voiced chants of zephyrs lone,
That swung like censers through the halls
By leafage arched, with leafage walls—
The lazy hum of insect song—
All seemed to woo the shades along
The golden rim of eventide,
As back and forth her paddle plied
Through solemn symphonies of gloom
Into the night-enshrouded tomb
Of recent day. The throbbing stars
Rose one by one above the bars
Of dark abysmal to the sea
Of heaven, and the mystery
Of Nature's silence robed her round
With garments threaded by the sound
Of marsh-bird's wail, or pine-wood's moan.
At length she turned, and towards the zone
Of blackness, girding round the stream
As Lethe coils around a dream,
She swerved the course of the canoe,
And through the grasses, damp with dew,
That held their arms down from the bank
To fondle with the rushes rank,
Propelled its prow against the sand,
And silently sprang to the land.
III
She pulled aside a maple screen
That curtained off a weird ravine,
And stepped toward a smouldering flame,
O'er which crouched low an ancient dame
Whose wrinkled face, as leather dry,
Seemed dead, except that either eye
Shone with a fierce, malignant glare,
Like that which lights the wild-cat's lair
When danger pries into its keep.
"Mother, I'm glad you're not asleep,"
The maiden said in awesome way.
"I've dared the dark which follows day,
And paddled up through shade and gloom,
And grim, fantastic shapes that loom
Like giant goblins round the road
That leads to your retired abode."
"You're welcome, child, but never dread
That you'll disturb my sleeping bed,"
The dame's harsh voice made answer soon,
"I do not sleep till night-tide's noon
Has gone to meet the dawning day.
All night my tireless fancies play
Unceasing gambols with the gnomes
That chase each other 'neath the domes
That roof the wild deer's headlong path
When flying from the hunter's wrath.
Why came you here? Do troubles chase
You from your pillowed resting-place?
Has love bestowed a heart on you,
And come you here to prove it true?"
"No heart has love bestowed on me,
But mine has gone, and I to thee
Come in the anguish of my grief
To seek for solace or relief.
'Tis said that you can lift the screen
That veils the destinies unseen....
Until this summer I was free
And happy as the warbling birds;
My thoughts ran on in merry words,
As runnels ripple o'er the rocks,
Or careless as my own dark locks,
Which flung their mane to capture gleams
That glanced from sun-bedizened streams.
I watched the braves return one day
From a victorious foray,
And noted, towering o'er the rest,
A chieftain from the outbound west
With eyes of fire and haughty frown.
I met him ere the sun went down
And saw his frown turn to a smile,
And in his eyes the fire the while
Was fanned to fascination sweet.
The Eagle Eye a lover meet
Would be—" "Hist, child, footsteps approach!
Hide till we see who doth encroach
Within the bounds of my domain.
To yonder bush, and there remain
Until I call you forth again."
IV
The ancient crone revived the blaze
Until its red, uncertain rays
Crept down the hillside dun, and died
Upon the river's misty tide.
Then by the lurid flickering gleams,
That seemed dissolving out of dreams
Among the leafy arcades far,
She caught the glitter of a star
That silver-like shot from its nest
Upon a young brave's stalwart breast,
As up the forest path he came,
Attracted by the pinewood flame.
"Why comest thou?" her voice rang keen
Through shrouded glade and dim ravine.
"I come to pray you'll weave a spell
Whereby the future to foretell.
A chieftain I, in battle skilled,
Full many a foeman I have killed;
I've scalped the locks from many a brow,
And never shirked a task till now.
Through ghostly fogs, o'er leaping brooks,
'Mid slumbering snakes in dusky nooks,
O'er sullen lairs and reedy shades,
O'er quivering brakes and venomed glades,
O'er gusty hills, sun-flushed and high,
That shook their locks against the sky,
O'er shady stretches long and lone,
O'er rocky ledge, through caverned stone,
Past morning's prime, past twilight gray,
I've tracked my foemen on their way
With heart relentless, and with hand
Ready to hurl the deadly brand
With naught of mercy nor of fear.
And yet to-night I'm standing here,
Afraid to face a maiden's eyes,
Afraid to reach to grasp the prize
My heart desires all else above,
Her precious treasury of love.
I've tried to break the bonds that roll
Their magic coils around my soul,
By daring danger on the lake
When storm-clouds o'er its bosom break—
By roaming over flood and fell—
By trying every potent spell
The old magician 'neath the hill
Could summon to assist my will—
By chasing gravelights over graves,
And rambling where the were-wolf raves
Out threats of torture and of rack
To hapless ones that cross its track.
I've run death's gauntlet, day by day,
Where hungry wild-cats screech for prey,
But everywhere the haunting face
Of Budding Rose in matchless grace
Swims 'fore my eyes. Pray, mother, tell,
Will she return my love? Dispel
My doubts at once and seal my fate!"
"Sit down behind that bush and wait,"
The dame replied, "until I call
The wood-sprites up within my thrall."
V
She lit a smoking pine-knot red,
And swayed it thrice around her head,
Then hurled it hissing in the marsh,
The while her voice on air-wings harsh
Passed through the thronging shadows dense,
Unto love's hearing strained and tense.
"I hear the voices of the trees
In answer to the asking breeze,
And this is what the voices say:
'True love will always have its way!'
Come forth, my children, to the light;
The answer to the breeze is right."
The maiden came with drooping head,
The brave with grave and measured tread,
And joined their hands above the blaze.
"For you, fond lovers, length of days
I prophesy, and happy times.
Your lives shall run like merry rhymes
Through many years of full content,
And when at last your course is spent,
Your children shall revere your name,
Your children's children—" Flashed a flame,
A lightning blast, athwart their eyes,
And death assailed them in the guise
Of Iroquois, the Hurons' dread—
And seeress, lovers, all were dead!