I come, I am coming!
Whither? Ah, whither?
Upward! Upward the urge is!
Lower the clouds come drifting,
They stoop to the longing of love.
For me! for me!
Borne in the lap of you
Upwards!
Embracing, embraced!
Upwards, even to the bosom
Of thee all-loving, my Father!
WITH A COPY OF MY “POEMS”
My slender, wondering Nautilus,
Sunk in the ooze—a thing how frail!—
Because you choose to have it thus
Through wavering waters luminous
Rises once more, sets up the sail;
It trembles to the sun, has fear
Of life, that knew no fear of death:
Ah! may kind Ariel, hovering near,
Speed the toy onward with his breath!
PROLOGUE TO MAURICE GEROTHWOHL’S VERSION OF VIGNY’S “CHATTERTON”
(March 1909)
Not yet to life inured, the Muse’s son,
Born to be lord of visions, Chatterton,
A youth, nor yet the master of his dream,
Poor, proud, o’erwrought, perplex’d in the extreme
By poetry, his demon, and by love—
Powers of the deep below, the height above—
Ringed by a world with dreams and love at strife,
Rejects in fiery spleen the gift of life.
Condemn, but pity!
In the South, they say,
Boys in their sportive mood affect a play;
The brands aglow they fashion in a ring,
Then in the ardent cirque a scorpion fling;
Crouched motionless the creature lies, until
Urged by the fire you see him throb and thrill,
Whereon the laughter peals! Anon, he’ll shape
Right on the flames his course to make escape,
And backward draws o’erpowered. Fresh shouts of glee!
Next round the circle curving timorously
He seeks impossible exit; now, once more,
Quailing, and in the centre as before,
He shrinks despairing; lest, he knows his part,
Turns on himself, grown bold, his poisoned dart,
And on the instant dies. O then at height
We hear the cries uproarious of delight!
Doubtless the wretch on mortal crime was bent,
Doubtless the boys were good and innocent.
Play not, O world of men, the savage boy,
Make not the poet, quickener of earth’s joy,
Your scorpion! Hardly once a hundred years
Compact of spirit and fire and dew, appears
He through whose song the spheral harmonies
Vibrate in mortal hearing. Nay, be wise,
For your own joy, and see he lacks not bread,
If ye but wreathe the white brows of the dead,
’Tis ye yourselves are disinherited.