And this I’ve come to hold
One may be quite an old
Aristocrat;
But when one comes to die
Things are Democracy
And that is that!
CHRISTMAS EVE ON NANTUCKET.
For half an hour tonight we wander
Through the streets,
And see the Christmas trees against the lighted pane;
And catch child voices raised in glee and hear
Street singers chanting carols loud and free
Then a bell tone, and then the far-off sea.
We turn a corner and we pass a house
Whence strains of music come,
“Minuit Chrétians—” They will be singing that in Paris tonight!
From a side gate a scarlet figure booted, slips with bells
Jingling; some amateur Santa Claus late for festival.
Here a bright voiced smiling woman hurries along
To the dim lighted church, bearing a hemlock wreath
Made by her hands.
Upon white panelled doors hang other wreaths
Woven from ground pine near Wannacomet Pond.
And scarlet berries blaze
In window boxes bare of summer flowers
But now made Holiday.
Another narrow street, and here the candles shine
Ranging along the pane in a white row,
Lovely immaculates of memory.
And in another window a small figure
A dainty mandarin poised in Chinoise grace
Beneath some mistletoe!
And in one window more an old white head
Is bent over some early coming gift
Brought by the letter carrier
From children far away.
Late! Yet a few steps further, where the narrow lane
Turns to the moors. There in December skies
Tender with Christmas memories of years on years,
Hangs in its winter white, The Evening Star!
SONG OF THE LIGHTSHIPS.
(Landlubber’s Chantey.)
When the wolves of wind press hard
On the wild seas snarling pack,
And the waves bite the shore
And the shore bites back;
When the night’s like a cave
Full of black things howling
And the hurricanes rave
With the whistle buoy yowling.
There’s a rusty trusty boat that never makes a port,
There’s a scrubby bold boat that never finds a lee,
The blunt little lightship,
The iron clad lightship,
The weather-wise lightship,
Anchored out at sea!
When the storms signal’s set,
Great Point stuck with masts,
And the range lights blur
Through the wicked black blasts
When the extra anchors drag
And the bell buoy clangs
And the jetty rocks swirl
Under tide rips fangs.