BY ELLA WHEELER WILCOX
HIS art was loving. Eros set his sign
Upon that youthful forehead, and he drew
The hearts of women, as the sun draws dew.
Love feeds love’s thirst as wine feeds love of wine.
Nor is there any potion from the vine
Which makes men drunken, like the subtle brew,
Of kisses crushed by kisses; and he grew
Inebriated with that draught divine.
Yet in his sober moments, when the sun
Of radiant summer paled to lonely fall
And passion’s sea had grown an ebbing tide,
From out the many Memory singled one
Full cup that seemed the sweetest of them all—
The warm, red mouth that mocked him and denied!
Martyrdom
BY LEONARD CHARLES VAN NOPPEN
THE world cries loud for blood; for never grew
One saving truth that blossomed, man to bless,
That withered not in barren loneliness
Till watered by the sacrificial dew.
Behold the prophets stoned—the while they blew
A warning blast—the sad immortal guess
Of Socrates—the thorn-crowned lowliness
Of Christ! And that black cross our Lincoln knew!
’Tis only through the whirlwind and the storm
That man can ever reach his starry goal;
Someone must bleed or else the world will die.
Upon the flaring altar of reform
Some heart lies quivering ever. To what soul
That dares be true, comes not the martyr’s agony?
The Debt