Cactus and pine: Songs of the Southwest

by Sharlot Mabridth Hall

THE HYMN OF THE MEN THAT FAIL

Lo, here we face the Weigher with our balance; we, who out of all our toil have won
Only hope fore-spent and ideals vanished; only scars and sweat beneath the sun;
All we dared, and spent our hearts in daring, grasping as a hand that grasps a star,
Star-wise in its beauty and eluding lies beyond us still as dim and far.
And the soul that panoplied for battle once rode bravely forth in Fortune’s train;
Wise now by futile march and foray, knows the high adventure was in vain:
We have gained no laurels for our striving, naught of praise from them that sit to judge;
Yet while there is room for new endeavor life is all too full for fret or grudge.
We have failed—and bitter was the failing; full the price we paid of faith and trust;
Still our souls turn backward unavailing to the Gods thrown prostrate in the dust:
For we could not keep the sight of childhood; and the Grail our hearts set out to seek—
It was but a vessel, empty, earthen—yet we had the joy of them that seek.
All the winds of earth have blown us backward; all her tides have turned our course awry;
And though night be gemmed with starry splendor there is never lode star in our sky:
Straight against the winds of Fate we venture; in the teeth of every tide we steer;
High above the darkness that enfolds us burns our guiding hope forever clear.
We are them that fail; our hands are empty; hall and mart and temple know us not;
Power is not to us, nor place uplifted; wit is not of us to plan and plot;
But the wide and lonely places know us; hill and plain and wood and dark morrass;
And the light of homes and smoke of cities rise behind our footsteps as we pass.
We have broke the way our brother followed; we have set the harvest to his hand;
And the gold he heaps to fill his coffers we have winnowed out of barren sand:
Earth yields her good to only stern compellers; ours the knotted grip that bent her will;
Bound her to the serving of our kindred—and her captive-hate is on us still.
Homeless we have reared the homes of nations; mirthless we have laughed for others’ mirth;
Striven that another might have honor, as the stars appointed at our birth;
Ours the blood that reddened fields forgotten; ours the faith that sped a hope forlorn;
Ours the eyes that doomed to watch through darkness, see the first, far promises of morn.
We are them that fail—O ye that reckon—holding high our shortage to be weighed;
Grant ye that no other bore our burden; grant ye that the debt we made we paid:
We have failed; but beaten and defeated, still we face whatever Life may send;
Still we ask no odds of Fate or Fortune—we that go down fighting to the end.

THE LAST CAMP-FIRE

Scar not earth’s breast that I may have
Somewhere above her heart a grave;
Mine was a life whose swift desire
Bent ever less to dust than fire;
Then through the swift, white path of flame
Send back my soul to whence it came:
From some great peak storm-challenging,
My death-fire to the heavens fling;
The rocks my altar, and above
The still eyes of the stars I love;
No hymn, save as the midnight wind
Comes whispering to seek his kind.
Heap high the logs of spruce and pine,
Balsam for spices and for wine;
Brown cones, and knots a golden blur
Of hoarded pitch more sweet than myrrh;
Cedar to stream across the dark
Its scented embers spark on spark;
Long shaggy boughs of juniper,
And silvery, odorous sheafs of fir;
Spice wood to die in incense smoke
Against the stubborn roots of oak—
Red to the last for hate or love,
As that red, stubborn heart above.
Watch till the last pale ember dies,
Till wan and low the dead pyre lies;
Then let the thin, white ashes blow
To all earth’s winds, a finer snow;
There is no wind of hers but I
Have loved it as it whistled by;
No leaf whose life I would not share,
No weed that is not someway fair:
Hedge not my dust in one close urn,
It is to these I would return—
The wild, free winds, the things that know
No master’s rule, no ordered row.
To be, if nature will, at length
Part of some great tree’s noble strength;
Growth of the grass; to live anew
In many a wild flower’s richer hue;
Find immortality indeed
In ripened heart of fruit and seed.
Time grants not any man redress
Of his broad law, forgetfulness:—
I parley not with shaft and stone,
Content that in the perfume blown
From next year’s hillsides something sweet,
And mine, shall make earth more complete.

THE GIVERS

At the house of a soul once came knocking
The first of a line of gift-bearers,
Close-veiled and light-footed as silence,
And speaking with voice soft and tender:
“Lo, here is a season for growing,”
He said, then passed into the stillness,
Leaving his room to a brother.
And they that came after him softly
Set down in the doorway their burdens,
And whispered, “Make use of them swiftly,
O soul, ere one cometh to reckon.”
But he, the proud soul, laughing lightly,
Looked up where the sun was unrisen
And said, “I will slumber till daybreak.”
So he turned on his pillow and, dreaming,
Saw laurels inwoven to crown him;
And wealth for his taking; and Beauty,
With love in her eyes, run to meet him;
Then he woke to a step in the doorway:
“All night at thy feet lay thy wishes;
Now I take them,” one said, and departed.

A CREED

Let others frame their creeds; mine is to work;
To do my best, however far it fall
Below the keener craft of stronger hands:
To be myself, full-hearted, free, and true
To what my own soul sees, below, above;
To think my thought straight-forward from the heart;
To feel, and be, and never stop to ask:
“Do all men so? Is this the World’s highway?”
To look unflinching in the face of life
As eagles look upon the noonday sun;
To cut my own path through primeval woods;
To lay my own course by the polar star
Across the trackless plains and mountains vast;
To seek, not follow, ever to the end.
And for the rest—bare-handed have I come
Into this world, I know not whence nor why;
Bare-handed and alone and unafraid,
With heart of fire and eyes that question still,
Will I go forth into the wide Beyond;
As went the men who bore my blood of old
To prove their dream of Heaven, or dare their Hell.

QUITS

Life made no easy truce with me,
He set no white flag on my road;
Unshod he thrust me to the trail
And laughed the while he piled my load.
Greeting, old master! Greeting, friend!
I’ve made you friend; I’ve fought you fair;
I’ve stumbled, fallen, scrambled up;
Yet somehow borne the appointed share
To this last station. Take the pack;
Sort, weigh it—lack or over-due,
Still here’s the load; the climb was mine,
Scars, road-marks—all the rest to you.
We’re done; shake hands before we part.
I rest here—feel the wind and rain
Year-long blow past my rough, brown tent—
Joy with you till we meet again!