THE LOST THOUGHTS
Guy de Maupassant, in his last days, believed his thoughts to be fluttering about his head like many-colored butterflies. “Where are my lost thoughts? Who will tell me where to find my thoughts?” he cried to those who tended him.
See! Do you see that wondrous, winged cloud?
As if all the garden flowers had taken flight
Into the blue air for a holiday,
And left their tall green stalks beteared with dew?
They are butterflies now, but once I know
They were my thoughts. I called them when I chose;
They came to me in gentle, circling troops
Like fairies tamed by love, and poised upon
My hands, and brushed my cheeks and lips with wings
As soft as Psyche’s kisses in the dark.
There was a white one like an orient pearl
Seen in the moonlight; pure and holy as
The Virgin’s white throat in the candle shine
Of her high altar—or a young girl’s soul.
There was a girl—we two were boy and girl
And play-mate lovers. I must have caught
The white wings roughly, for they still are stained.
I do forget—but Ah! the silken-bright
Red poppy flowers that are red butterflies!
My thoughts, my thoughts, shot through with gleaming gold
And gemmed and jewelled like a Hindu queen,
Amber and emerald, ruby and topaz,
And charmful jade, and opal’s mystic fire;
And richer dyes than Tyre knew in her pride—
(My own soul broken to a thousand hues
As light upon a prism—the prism Life.)
My wingèd thoughts! My heavenly butterflies!
Now they are black, all black, with eyes of fire;
I smother in the sable of their wings
That wrap around me like a velvet pall—
I cannot see the sun for their deep eyes—
Be merciful! My butterflies! O my lost thoughts!
THE STRANGER
Art stranger, Love? because no lover’s hand
Hath clasped my own with pressure strong and sweet?
Because my ears heed not those tender tales
That hearts in tune with Spring and thee repeat?
Nay, rather walk we closer, soul to soul,
Great Love and I; I love thee all too much
To jar thy music with a lesser tone,
Or mar thy radiance with a duller touch.
I hold me to thy uses consecrate,
As some white temple set beside the sea;
With close-shut door no foot may enter in
Till fair tides bring its own divinity:
Here are no withered flowers against the shrine;
No dusty highways through the beaten grass
Where all men go; only the birds and thee,
The salt winds and the sun, unstayed may pass.
DAY’S END
Swiftly at set of sun,
The long day being done,
I seek my love;
Her whom my heart doth hold
Dearer than gems and gold
Or treasure trove.
Still are her eyes and cool
As some clear mountain pool
Fern-hid and lone,
Some reed-edged pool that lies
Blue under star-lit skies,
The wild-fowl flown;
The ousel’s fluting note
Hushed in his dappled throat,
The night wind still—
And over all the peace
Which is my soul’s release
From life sore-spent and days that reckon ill.
THE FIRST FIRE ON THE HEARTH
Clean as a new-built altar to the Gods
The new hearth stands;
No tears have stained, no prayers have hallowed it;
Make clean thy hands
As some High Priest who tends the holy flame
Life-long in temples old;
Bring not to kindle this divine first fire
Wood that is bought and sold
In common marts; but such as symbols clear
The life that thou shalt make,
Here under this new roof, by this new hearth,
For Great Love’s sake.
Bring heart of pine to point thee to the stars;
Higher and yet more high
Thy thought on its green pinions shall ascend—
Yet keep thee ever nigh
Tender and kind to every earth-born need;
As low-spread cedar boughs
Give grateful shade, or laid upon the fire
Shed fragrance through the house.
Here let the oak outspend his noble strength
In flame that shall endure
Beyond the last red coal to thy life’s end
In strength as great and sure.
Lay here red sandal and dark orient teak,
That their rich wood may turn
To star-crowned dreams and visions in the flame
Wherein their kindred burn;
And mystic, harp-stringed branches of the palm—
Prophet and seer of trees—
Speeding thy life through all that can beset
To noblest destinies:
Bring these, as men bring votive offerings,
And let rare spices fall
Into the unswept flame. High, higher yet,
Thy life at Love’s great call!