Well, then
The first hour that I call an hour of heaven:
Who was that man that built the first hotel?—
It stood across the river from the Fort—
No matter. But before that I had heard
Nothing beside a fiddle, living here
Amid the traders eleven years or so.
And this man for his hotel’s opening
Had brought an orchestra from somewhere. Think
Bass viols, violins, and horns and flutes.
I’m dressed up like a princess for those days.
I’m sixteen years of age and pass the door,
Enter the ball-room where such candle-light
As I had never seen shone on me, they
Bored sockets in suspended wheels of wood
And hung them from the ceiling, chandeliers!
And at that moment all the orchestra
Broke into music, yes, it was a waltz!
And in that moment—what a moment-full!
This hotel man presented you and said
You were my partner for the evening. Jean
I call this heaven, for its youth and love!
I’m sixteen and you’re twenty and I love you.
I slip my arm through yours for you to lead me,
You are so strong, so ruddy, kind and brave.
I want you for a husband, for a friend,
A guide, a solace, father to the child
That I can bear. Oh Jean how can I talk so
In this lone church at mid-night of such things,
With all these candles burning round your face.
I who have rounded ninety-years, and look
On what was sweet, long seventy years ago?
Feeling this city even at mid-night move
In restlessness, desire, around this church,
Where once I saw the prairie grass and flowers;
And saw the Indians in their colored trappings
Pour from a bottle of whisky on the fire
A tribute to the Spirit of the world,
And dance and sing for madness of that Spirit?
Well, Jean, my other hour. I’ve spoken before
Of our long life together glad and sad,
But mostly good. I’m happy for it all.
This other hour is marked, I call it heaven
Just as I told you, not because they stood
Around me as a mystery from the past,
And looked at me admiringly for my age,
My strength in age, my life that spanned the growth
Of my Chicago from a place of huts,
Just four or five, a fort, and all around it
A wilderness, to what it is this hour
Where most three million souls are living, nor
Because I saw this rude life, and beheld
The World’s Fair where such richnesses of time
Were spread before me—not because of these,
Nor for the ninety roses, nor the tribute
They paid me in them, nor their gentle words—
These did not make that hour a heaven, no—
Jean, it was this:
First I was just as happy
As I was on that night we danced together.
And that I could repeat that hour’s great bliss
At ninety years, though in a different way,
And for a different cause, that was the thing
That made me happy. For you see it proves,
Just give the soul a chance it’s happiness
Is endless, let the body house it well,
Or house it ill, but give it but a chance
To speak itself, not stifle it, or hush it
With hands of flesh against the quivering strings,
Made sick or weak by time, the soul will find
Delights as good as youth has to the end.
And even if the flesh be sick there’s Heine:
Few men had raptures keen as his, though lying
With death beside him through a stretch of years.
It must be something in the soul as well,
Which makes me think a third hour shall be mine
In spite of death, yes Jean it must be so!
I want that third hour, I shall pray for it
Unceasingly, I want it for my soul’s sake:
Which will have happiness in its very power
And dignity that time nor change can hurt.
For if I have it you shall have it too.
And in that third hour we shall give each other
Something that’s kindred to the souls we gave
That night we danced together—but much more!...
It’s dawn! Good bye till then, my Jean, good bye!
IV
THE OUIJA BOARD
(David Kennison died in Chicago February 24th, 1852, aged 115 years, 3 months and 17 days. Veteran of the Revolution.)
David Kennison is here born at Kingston in the year
Seventeen thirty-seven and it’s nineteen sixteen now,
Dumped the tea into the harbor, saw Cornwallis’ career
End at Yorktown with the sullen thunder written on his brow.
Was at West Point when the traitor Arnold gave up the fort,
Saw them hang Major Andre for a spy and his due.
Settled down in Sackett’s Harbor for a rest of a sort,
Till I crossed the western country in the year forty-two.
And I saw Chicago rising in the ten years to come,
Ere I passed in the fifties to the peace of the dead.
Now where is there a city in the whole of Christendom
Where such roar is and such walking is around a grave’s head?
Oh, ’twas fighting as a soldier in the wars of the land;
And ’twas giving and living to make the people free
That kept me past a century an oak to withstand
The heat and snow and weevils that break down a tree.