***
In his manhood he defended
All that greatness has and beauty;
Later he the stars attended
In their silent course to God.
Northern flowers were his pleasure,
As an aged genial gardener,
From his nation's springtime treasure
Culling seed for deathless growth.
Now with humor, now sedately,
He kept planting or uprooting,
While the Danish beech-tree stately
Gave his soul its evening peace.
There the tree we saw him under,
And the garden gate is open,
While we cast a glance and wonder
Whether some one sits there still.
THE OCEAN
(FROM ARNLJOT GELLINE)
(See Note 8)
… Oceanward I am ever yearning,
Where far it rolls in its calm and grandeur,
The weight of mountain-like fogbanks bearing,
Forever wandering and returning.
The skies may lower, the land may call it,
It knows no resting and knows no yielding.
In nights of summer, in storms of winter,
Its surges murmur the self-same longing.
Yes, oceanward I am ever yearning,
Where far is lifted its broad, cold forehead!
Thereon the world throws its deepest shadow
And mirrors whispering all its anguish.
Though warm and blithesome the bright sun stroke it
With joyous message, that life is gladness,
Yet ice-cold, changelessly melancholy,
It drowns the sorrow and drowns the solace.
The full moon pulling, the tempest lifting,
Must loose their hold on the flowing water.
Down whirling lowlands and crumbling mountains
It to eternity tireless washes.
What forth it draws must the one way wander.
What once is sunken arises never.
No message comes thence, no cry is heard thence;
Its voice, its silence, can none interpret.
Yes, toward the ocean, far out toward ocean,
That knows no hour of self-atonement!
For all that suffer release it offers,
But trails forever its own enigma.
A strange alliance with Death unites it,
That all it give Him,—itself excepting!