No tribal laws or priestly hand
Can rivet adverse hearts in one;
Compulsion has no iron band
So strong it may not be undone;
But ties of mutual interest
That spring spontaneous from the soul,
Are never by themselves oppressed,
Their silken cords have full control.
To know, to feel, to fully share
The joys and sorrows of this life,
Unites the souls of mated pair,
And make the husband and the wife.
Ponomo and Almeta there,
Where juts of rocks 'neath hemlock boughs,
Had breathed a mutual, fervent prayer,
And each to each pledged sacred vows,
When o'er the lake the war-whoop rang,
And Kitchewonks, on every side,
Swept down with shout and yell and clang,
Upon Ponomo and his bride.
On north and south, and on the west,
No way of flight then could they take,
So from the rough rocks' rugged side
They plunged into the central lake.
A hundred arrows cleft the air,
But one alone had reached its mark.
Ponomo felt it roughly tear
Its way into his faithful heart.
He shrieked and sank beneath the wave,
Almeta followed after him;
Their bridal couch was watery grave,
The war-whoop was their requiem.
The savage yell of victory
Re-echoed then from shore to shore,
While every rock and every tree
Seemed deeply tinged with human gore,
For when the moon from heavenly throne
Looked down and saw the ghastly deed,
It veiled itself and feebly shone,
As if in agony to plead
That human souls might ever know
That God himself cannot approve
The hand that strikes avenging blow,
The soul devoid fraternal love.
'Neath crystal waters of the lake,
In silent, undisturbed repose,
Where sounds of strife no slumbers break,
Heedless alike of friends and foes,
They slept the long, long sleep of death,
Through centuries of rolling years,
While o'er their forms the zephyrs' breath
In playful eddyings oft appears.
Their race has faded from the shore
And left few traces that they were;
The war-whoop now resounds no more,
They bowed before White Conqueror.
Full many a fathom 'neath the wave,
Their forms have mouldered side by side,
While shadowy hemlocks fringe the grave
Of dark Ponomo and his bride.
The waters then were deeper made
Which gave their spirits much unrest,
The lake their agony betrayed
And seemed on every side distressed.
One spring when Nature gaily dressed
With charms that could the mind beguile,
There rose upon the lake's fair breast
A hibernating, floating isle.
Devoid of life it seemed at first,
Chaotic, dull, with beauty none,
But rays of sunshine on it burst
And changed it to a paragon.
Two alders sprang from near its edge
And twined in close embrace,
While ferns and grass gave certain pledge
That Time should give it smiling face.
But when the frosts of autumn fell
It sank from sight, perchance to rest;
No searching mind could ever tell
The secret of its rising crest.
For years, at each returning spring,
The isle would rise from 'neath the wave,
As if to memory to bring
Ponomo and Almeta's grave.
But when the harvest-moon shone bright,
It meekly sank; as years before
When on that dread, but fatal night,
The faithful sank by rock-bound shore.
Its verdure grew, its alders spread,
Its fame extended many a mile,
'Twas type of resurrected dead—
This hibernating, floating isle.
But vandal hands destroyed the prize
And sank it 'neath a weight of stones,
While Almeta sends forth her sighs,
And Ponomo emits his groans.
Here let them rest, if rest they may,
Amid the beauteous scenes around,
And wait in peace the final day,
When at the angel's trumpet sound,
The water shall give up its prey,
The earth shall full surrender make,
For heaven has not a type to-day,
More perfect than this sky-blue lake.