TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: Printer's inconsistencies in spelling, punctuation, hyphenation, and ligature usage have been retained.

NIRVANA DAYS

NIRVANA DAYS

BY

CALE YOUNG RICE

AUTHOR OF
CHARLES DI TOCCA, A NIGHT IN AVIGNON,
YOLANDA OF CYPRUS, DAVID, ETC.

NEW YORK
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
MCMIX

Copyright, 1909, by Cale Young Rice

TO

JAMES LANE ALLEN

WITH FRIENDSHIP AND
FAITHFUL ESTEEM

FOREWORD

A few of the poems of this volume are retained from two of the author's earlier volumes which are now out of print. The rest are new.

CONTENTS

NIRVANA DAYS

INVOCATION

(From a High Cliff)

Sweep unrest
Out of my blood,
Winds of the sea! Sweep the fog
Out of my brain
For I am one
Who has told Life he will be free.
Who will not doubt of work that's done,
Who will not fear the work to do.
Who will hold peaks Promethean
Better than all Jove's honey-dew.
Who when the Vulture tears his breast
Will smile into the Terror's Eyes.
Who for the World has this Bequest—
Hope, that eternally is wise.

THE FAIRIES OF GOD

Last night I slipt from the banks of dream
And swam in the currents of God,
On a tide where His fairies were at play,
Catching salt tears in their little white hands,
For human hearts;
And dancing dancing, in gala bands,
On the currents of God;
And singing, singing:—
There is no wind blows here or spray—
Wind upon us!
Only the waters ripple away
Under our feet as we gather tears.
God has made mortals for the years,
Us for alway!
God has made mortals full of fears,
Fears for the night and fears for the day.
If they would free them from grief that sears,
If they would keep all that love endears,
If they would lay no more lilies on biers—
Let them say!
For we are swift to enchant and tire
Time's will!
Our feet are wiser than all desire,
Our song is better than faith or fame;
To whom it is given no ill e'er came,
Who has it not grows chill!
Who has it not grows laggard and lame,
Nor knows that the world is a Minstrel's lyre,
Smitten and never still!...
Last night on the currents of God.

A SONG OF THE OLD VENETIANS

The seven fleets of Venice
Set sail across the sea
For Cyprus and for Trebizond
Ayoub and Araby.
Their gonfalons are floating far,
St. Mark's has heard the mass,
And to the noon the salt lagoon
Lies white, like burning glass.

The seven fleets of Venice—
And each its way to go,
Led by a Falier or Tron,
Zorzi or Dandalo.
The Patriarch has blessed them all,
The Doge has waved the word,
And in their wings the murmurings
Of waiting winds are heard.

The seven fleets of Venice—
And what shall be their fate?
One shall return with porphyry
And pearl and fair agàte.
One shall return with spice and spoil
And silk of Samarcand.
But nevermore shall one win o'er
The sea, to any land.

Oh, they shall bring the East back,
And they shall bring the West,
The seven fleets our Venice sets
A-sail upon her quest.
But some shall bring despair back
And some shall leave their keels
Deeper than wind or wave frets,
Or sun ever steals.

NIRVANA DAYS

I

If I were in Japan today,
In little Japan today,
I'd watch the sampan-rowers ride
On Yokohama bay.
I'd watch the little flower-folk
Pass on the Bund, where play
Of "foreign" music fills their ears
With wonder new alway.

Or in a kuruma I'd step
And "Noge-yama!" cry,
And bare brown feet should wheel me fast
Where Noge-yama, high
Above the city and sea's vast
Uprises, with the sigh
Of pines about its festal fanes
Built free to sun and sky.

And there till dusk I'd sit and think
Of Shaka Muni, lord
Of Buddhas; or of Fudo's fire
And rope and lifted sword.
And, ere I left, a surging shade
Of clouds, a distant horde,
Should break and Fugi's cone stand clear—
With sutras overscored.

Sutras of ice and rock and snow,
Written by hands of heat
And thaw upon it, till 'twould seem
Meant for the final seat
Of the lord Buddha and his bliss—
If ever he repeat
This life where millions still are bound
Within Illusion's cheat.

II

Or were I in Japan today—
Perchance at Kyoto—
Down Tera-machi I would search
For charm or curio.
Up narrow stairs in sandals pure
Of soil or dust I'd go
Into a room of magic shapes—
Gods, dragons, dread Nio.

And seated on the silent mats,
With many a treasure near—
Of ivory the gods have dreamt,
And satsuma as dear,
Of bronzes whose mysterious mint
Seems not of now or here—
I'd buy and dream and dream and buy,
Lost far in Mâyâ's sphere.

Then gathering up my gains at last,
Mid "sayonaras" soft
And bows and gentle courtesies
Repeated oft and oft,
My host and I should part—"O please
The skies much weal to waft
His years," I'd think, then cross San-jo
To fair Chion-in aloft.

For set aloft and set apart,
Beyond the city's din,
Under the shade of ancient heights
Lies templed calm Chion-in.
And there the great bell's booming fills
Its gates all day, and thin
Low beating on mokugyo, by
Priests passioning for sin.

And there the sun upon its courts
And carvings, gods and graves,
Rests as no light of earth-lands known,
Like to Nirvana laves
And washes with sweet under-flow
Into the soul's far caves.
And no more shall this life seem real
To one who feels its waves.

"No more!" I'd say, then wander on
To Kiyomizu-shrine,
Which is so old antiquity's
Far self cannot divine
Its birth, but knows that Kwannon, she
Of mercy's might benign,
Has reached her thousand hands always
From it to Nippon's line.

And She should hear my many prayers,
And have my freest gifts.
And many days beside her should
I watch the crystal rifts
Of Otawa's clear waters earn
Their way, o'er rocks and drifts,
Beside the trestled temple down—
Like murmurs of sweet shrifts.

Then, when the city wearied me,
To Katsura I'd wend—
A garden hid across green miles
Of rice-lands quaintly penned.
And, by the stork-bestridden lake,
I'd walk or musing mend
My soul with lotus-memories
And hopes—without an end.

III

Or were I in Japan today,
Hiroshima should call
My heart—Hiroshima built round
Her ancient castle wall.
By the low flowering moat where sun
And silence ever fall
Into a swoon, I'd build again
Old days of Daimyo thrall.

Of charge and bloody countercharge,
When many a samurai
Fierce-panoplied fell at its pale,
Suppressing groan or cry;
Suppressing all but silent hates
That swept from eye to eye,
While lips smiled decorously on,
Or mocked urbane goodbye.

Then to the river I would pass
And drift upon its tide
By many a tea-house hung in bloom
Above its mirrored side.
And geisha fluttering gay before
Their guests should pause in pied
Kimono, then with laughter bright
Behind the shoji hide.

Unto an isle of Ugina's
Low port my craft should swing,
Or scarce an island seems it now
To my fair fancying,
But a shrined jut of earth up thro
The sea from which to sing
Unto the evening star of all
Night's incarnations bring.

Then backward thro the darkened streets
I'd walk: long lanterns writ
With ghostly characters should dance
Beside each door, or flit,
Thin paper spirits, to and fro
And mow the wind, when it
Demanded of them reverence
And passed with twirl or twit.

What music, too, of samisen
And koto I should hear!
Tinkle on weirder tinkle thro
The strangely wistful ear
What shadows on the shoji-door
Of my dim soul should veer
All night in sleep, and haunt the light
Of many a coming year!

IV

Or were I in Japan today,
From Ujina I'd sail
For mountain-isled Migajima
Upon the distance, frail
As the mirage, to Amida,
Of this world's transient tale,
Where he sits clothed in boundless light
And sees it vainly ail.

Up to the great sea-torii,
Its temple-gate, I'd wind,
There furl my sail beneath its beam;
And soon my soul should find
What it shall never, tho it sift
The world elsewhere, and blind
Itself at last with sight of all
Earth's blisses to mankind.

"Migajima! Migajima!"
How would enchantment chant
The syllables within me, till
Desire should cease and pant
Of passion press no more my will—
But let charmed peace supplant
All thought of birth and death and birth—
Yea, karma turn askant.

For on Migajima none may
Give birth and none may die—
Since birth and death are equal sins
Unto the wise. So I
Should muse all day where the sea spills
Its murmur softly by
The still stone lanterns all arow
Under the deathless sky.

And under cryptomeria-tree
And camphor-tree and pine,
And tall pagoda, rising roof
On roof into the shine
Of the pure air—red roof on roof,
With memories in each line
Of far Confucian China where
They first were held divine.

And o'er Migajima the moon
Should rise for me again.
So magical its glow, I dare
Think of it only when
My heart is strong to shun the snare
Of witcheries that men
May lose their souls in evermore,
Nor, after, care nor ken.

V

Yes, were I in Japan today
These things I'd do, and more.
For Ise gleams in royal groves,
And Nara with its lore,
And Nikko hid in mountains—where
The Shogun, great of yore,
Built timeless tombs whose glory glooms
Funereally o'er.

These things I'd do! But last of all,
On Kamakura's lea,
I'd seek Daibutsu's face of calm
And still the final sea
Of all the West within me—from
Its fret and fever free
My spirit—into patience, peace,
And passion's mastery.

THE YOUNG TO THE OLD

You who are old—
And have fought the fight—
And have won or lost or left the field—
Weigh us not down
With fears of the world, as we run!
With the wisdom that is too right,
The warning to which we cannot yield,
The shadow that follows the sun,
Follows forever!
And with all that desire must leave undone,
Though as a god it endeavor;
Weigh, weigh us not down!

But gird our hope to believe—
That all that is done
Is done by dream and daring—
Bid us dream on!
That Earth was not born
Or Heaven built of bewaring—
Yield us the dawn!
You dreamt your hour—and dared, but we
Would dream till all you despaired of be;
Would dare—till the world,
Won to a new wayfaring,
Be thence forever easier upward drawn!

OFF THE IRISH COAST

Gulls on the wind,
Crying! crying!
Are you the ghosts
Of Erin's dead?
Of the forlorn
Whose days went sighing
Ever for Beauty
That ever fled?

Ever for Light
That never kindled?
Ever for Song
No lips have sung?
Ever for Joy
That ever dwindled?
Ever for Love that stung?

A VISION OF VENUS AND ADONIS

I know not where it was I saw them sit,
For in my dreams I had outwandered far
That endless wanderer men call the sea—
Whose winds like incantations wrap the world
And help the moon in her high mysteries.
I know not how it was that I was led
Unto their tryst; or what dim infinite
Of perfect and imperishable night
Hung round, a radiance ineffable;
For I was too intoxicate and tranced
With beauty that I knew was very love.
So when divinity from her had stolen
Into his spirit, as, from fields of myrrh
Or forests of red sandal by the sea,
Steal slaking airs, and he began to speak,
I could but gather these few fleeting words:
"Your glance sends fragrance sweeter than the lily,
Your hands are visible bodiments of song
You are the voice that April light has lost,
Her silence that was music of glad birds.
The wind's heart have you, and its mystery,
When poet Spring comes piping o'er the hills
To make of Tartarus forgotten fear.
Yea all the generations of the world,
Whose whence and whither but the gods shall know.
Are vassal to your vows forevermore."
And she, I knew, made answer, for her words
Fell warm as womanhood with wordless things,
But I had drifted on within my dream,
To that pale space which is oblivion.

SOMNAMBULISM

I

Night is above me,
And Night is above the night.
The sea is beside me soughing, or is still.
The earth as a somnambulist moves on
In a strange sleep ...
A sea-bird cries.
And the cry wakes in me
Dim, dead sea-folk, my sires—
Who more than myself are me.
Who sat on their beach long nights ago and saw
The sea in its silence;
And cursed it or implored:
Or with the Cross defied;
Then on the morrow in their boats went down.

II

Night is above me ...
And Night is above the night.
Rocks are about me, and, beyond, the sand ...
And the low reluctant tide,
That rushes back to ebb a last farewell
To the flotsam borne so long upon its breast.
Rocks.... But the tide is out,
And the slime lies naked, like a thing ashamed
That has no hiding-place.
And the sea-bird hushes—
The bird and all far cries within my blood—
And earth as a somnambulist moves on.

SERENATA MAGICA

(Venetian)

My gondola is a black sea-swan,
And glides beneath the moon.
Dark palaces beside me pass,
Like visions in a beryl-glass
Of what shall never be, alas,
Or what has been too soon.
Like what shall never be, but in
The breathing of a swoon.

My gondola is a black sea-swan,
And makes her mystic way
From door to phantom water-door,
While carven balconies hang o'er
And casements framed for love say more
Than love can ever say.
Say more than any voice but voice
Of silent magic may.

My gondola is a black sea-swan—
Rialto lies behind.
And by me the Salute swings,
A loveliness that must take wings
And vanish, as imaginings
Within an Afrit's mind;
As vague and vast imaginings
That can no substance find.

My gondola is a black sea-swan:
San Marco and the shaft
Of the slim Campanile steal
Into my trance and leave a seal
Upon my senses, like the feel
Of long enchantment quaffed:
Of long enchantments such as songs
Of sage Al Raschid waft.

My gondola is a black sea-swan
And gains to the lagoon,
Where samphire and sea-lavender
Around me float or softly stir,
While far-off Venice still lifts her
Fair witchery to the moon
And all that wonder e'er gave birth
Seems out of beauty hewn.

O-SHICHI AND MOTO

I

O-Shichi, all my heart today
Is dreaming of your fate;
And of your little house that stood
Beside the temple gate;
Of its plum-garden hid away
Behind white paper doors;
And of the young boy-priest who read too late with you love-lores.

II

O-Shichi dwelt in Yedo—where
A thousand wonders dwell.
Gods, golden palaces and shrines
That like a charm enspell.
O-Shichi dwelt among them there,
More wondrous, she, than all—
A flower some forgetful god had from his hand let fall.

III

And all her days were as the dream
On flowers in the sun.
And all her ways were as the waves
That by Shin-bashi run.
And in her gaze there was the gleam
Of stars that cannot wait
Too long for love and so fare forth from heaven to find a mate.

IV

O-Shichi dwelt so, till one night
When all the city slept,
When not a paper lantern swung,
When only fire-flies swept
Soft cipherings of spirit-light
Across the temple's gloom—
Sudden a cry was heard—the cry that should O-Shichi doom.

V

For following the cry came flame,
A Chaya's roof a-blaze.
And quickly was the street a stream
Of stricken folk, whose gaze
Knew well that when the morning came
Their homes would be but smoke
Vanished upon the winds: now had O-Shichi's fate awoke.

VI

And waited. For at morning priests
In pity of her years
And desolation led her back
Behind the great god's spheres;
The great god Buddha, who of beasts
And men all mindful was.
O Buddha, in thy very courts O-Shichi learned love's laws!

VII

Love of the body and the soul,
Not of Nirvana's state!
Love that beyond itself can see
No beauty wise or great.
O-Shichi for a moon—a whole
Moon happy there beheld
The young boy-priest whose yearning e'er into his eyes upwelled.

VIII

So all too soon for her was found
Elsewhere a kindly thatch.
And all too soon O-Shichi heard
Behind her close love's latch.
They led her from the temple's ground
Into untrysting days.
And all too soon that happy moon was hid in sorrow's haze.

IX

For now at dawn she rose to dress
With blooms some honored vase,
Or to embroider or brew tea's
Sweet ceremonial grace.
Or she at dusk, in sick distress,
Before the butsudan,
Must to ancestral tablets pray—not to her Moto-San!

X

Not unto him, her love, who sways
Her breast, as moon the tide,
Whose breath is incense—Ah, again
To see him softly glide
Before the grave god-idol's gaze
Of inward ecstasy,
To watch the great bell boom for him its mystic sutra-plea.

XI

But weeks grew into weariness,
And weariness to pain,
And pain to lonely wildness, which
Set fire unto her brain.
And, "I will see my love!" distress
Made fair O-Shichi cry,
"Tho for ten lives away from him I then must live and die."

XII

Yet—no! She dared not go to him,
To her he could not come.
Then, sudden a thought her being swept
And struck her loud heart dumb.
Till in her rose confusion dim,
Fear fighting with Desire—
Which to O-Shichi took the shape of Fudo, god of fire.

XIII

And Fudo won her: for that night
Did fond O-Shichi dare
To set aflame her father's house,
Hoping again to share
The temple with her acolyte,
Her lover-priest, who, spent
With speechless passion for her face, in vain strove to repent.

XIV

But ah! what destiny can do
Is not for folly's hand.
The flames O-Shichi kindled were
From sea to Shiba fanned.
And it was learned a love-sick girl
Had charred a thousand homes.
Then were the fury-smitten folk like to a sea that foams.

XV

And so they seized her: but not in
The temple—O not there
Had she been led again by priests
In pity—led to share
Her lover's eyes; no, but her sin
Brought not one dear delight
To poor O-Shichi—who was now to look on her last rite.

XVI

For to the stake they bound her—fire
They lit—to be her fate....
O-Shichi, have I dreamt it all?
Your face, the temple gate,
The fair boy-priest shut from desire
In Buddhahood to-be?
Then let me dream and ever dream, O flower by Yedo's sea.

AS OF OLD

The fishermen bade their wives farewell,
(The sun floated merry up the morning)
They sang, to the rhythm of the low-swung swell,
"O come, lads, scorning
The highlands high,
There's no warning
In the blue south sky,
There's no warning,
O come, lads, free,
We'll cross the harbor bar and put to sea!"

The fisherwives prayed, the sails blew fast,
(O home it is happy where there's hoping)
They prayed—till the mist dimmed each dim mast:
Then "We're not moping,"
They sweetly sang,
"Winds come groping
And clouds o'erhang,
But we're not moping
Tho left ashore;
They'll come to us at dusk when day is o'er."

But swifter than God the sea-quake came,
(The fishers they were swallowed in its swirling)
O swifter than men could name God's name.
And white waves curling
Hissed in to shore.
The sea-birds whirling
Saw what, dashed hoar?
The sea-birds whirling
Saw dead upborne
The fishers that went forth upon the morn.

A PRAYER

One cricket left, of summer's choir.
One glow-worm, flashing life's last fire.
One frog with leathern croak
Beneath the oak,—
And the pool stands leaden
Where November twilights deaden
Day's unspent desire.

One star in heaven—East or West.
One wind—a gypsy seeking rest.
One prayer within my heart—
For all who part
Upon Death's dark portal,
With no hope of an immortal
Morrow for life's quest.

THE SONG OF A NATURE WORSHIPER

Live! Live! Live!
O send no day unto death,
Undrained of the light, of the song, of the dew,
Distilling within its breath.
Drink deep of the sun, drink deep of the night,
Drink deep of the tempest's brew,
Of summer, of winter, of autumn, of spring—
Whose flight can give what men never give!—
Live!

Live! Live! Live!
And love life's every throb:
The twinkling of shadows enmeshed in the trees,
The passionate sunset's sob;
The hurtling of wind, the heaving of hill,
The moon-dizzy cloud, the seas
That sweep with infinite sweeping all shores,
And thrill with a joy unfugitive!—
Live!

Live! Live! Live!
Unloose from custom and care,
From duty and sorrow and clinging design
Thy soul, through the silent Air.
Go into the fields where Nature's alone
And drink from her mystic wine
Divinity—till thou art even as She,
Great all ills of the world to forgive!
Live!

THE INFINITE'S QUEST

All night the rain
And the wind that beat
Dull wings of pain
On the seas without.
All night a Voice
That broke in my brain
And blew blind thoughts about.

All night they whirled
As a haunted throng
From some dim world
Where there is no rest.
All night the rain.
And the wind that swirled,
And the Infinite's lone quest.

LAD AND LASS

I heard the buds open their lips and whisper,
Whisper,
"Spring is here!"
The robins listened
And sang it loud.
The blue-birds came
In a fluttering crowd.
The cardinal preached
It high and proud,
Spring!

And thro the warm earth their song went trilling,
Trilling,
"Wake! Arise!"
The kingcups quickly
Assembled, strong.
The bluets stept
From the moss in throng.
Like fairies too
Came the cress along.
Spring!

And love in your breast, my lass, awaking—
Waking.
Love was born!
Your eyes were kindled,
Your lips were warm.
Wild beauties broke
From your face and form.
And all my heart
Was a heaven-storm,
Was Spring!

THE STRONG MAN TO HIS SIRES

Tonight as I was riding on a wave
Of triumph and of glory,
A Question suddenly, as from the grave,
Rose in me, culpatory.

"Whence come to you this joyance and this strength"
It said, "this might of vision?
This will that measures all things to its length,
That cuts with calm decision?

"This blood within your veins, that is as wine
Which Destiny's self blesses.
Whence flows it, from what grape that is divine,
Or trodden from what presses?

"Do you so proud forget what hands have borne
You to the heights and crowned you?
Would you behold what sackcloth has been worn
That laurels may surround you?"...

"I would—O lips invisible! whose breath"—
I answered—"so arraigns me;
Whose voice is as a sound sent forth of Death,
And like to Death entrains me.

"I would! For if the flesh of me and soul
Are fibred with the ages,
My triumph is of them and manifold
Of all life's mystic stages."

So, forth they came—a vast ancestral line,
Upon my vision teeming,
All shapes whose natal semblance could affine
Them to me, faintly gleaming.

I knew them as I knew myself, and felt
The Day of each within me;
And so began to speak, the while they dwelt
About—they who had been me.

"My Sires," I said, "think you I have forgot
The fervor of your living?
How into me is moulded all you thought.
Of getting or of giving?

"Think you I do not feel my every drop
Of blood is as an ocean
In which are surging and will never stop
All things your hope gave motion?

"My senses, that are swift to take delight
And shrine it in their being,
Are they not born of all your faith, and bright
With all your bliss of seeing?

"And my full heart within whose fount I hear
Your voices that are vanished,
Can it forget its gratitude or fear
Foes that you braved and banished?

"No. But the blindly striving years that led
You to the Rose's beauty,
Or taught you out of Ill to disembed
The golden veins of Duty;

"The wasting and incalculable wants
That in you quailed or quivered;
The longing that lit stars no dark now daunts—
I know, who stand delivered!

"To you then from whose throng the centuries
Long dead slip now their shrouding,
Who from oblivion's profundities
Rise up, and round are crowding,

"I say, Immortal do I hold your will!
Its gathered might ascending
Is sacred with the unconquerable might
Of God—who sees its ending;

"Of God—on whose strong Vine, Heredity,
Rooted in Voids primeval,
The world climbs ever to some great To-Be
Of passion or reprieval."

I said—and on night's infinite beheld
Silence alone beside me;
And majesty of greater meanings welled
Into my soul, to guide me.

AT STRATFORD

I could not sleep. The wind poured in my ear
Immortal names—Lear, Hamlet, Hal, Macbeth,
And thro the night I heard the rushing breath
Of ghost and witch and fool go whirling by.
I followed them, under the phantom sphere
Of the pale moon, along the Avon's near
And nimbused flowing, followed to his bier—
Who had evoked them first with mighty eye.
And as I gazed upon the peaceful spire
That points above earth's most immortal dust,
I could have asked God for His starry Lyre
Out of the skies to play my praise upon.
I could have shouted, as, O Wind, thou must,
"Here lies Humanity: kneel, and pass on."

THE IMAGE PAINTER

Up under the roof, in cold or heat,
Far up, aloof from the city street,
She sat all day
And painted gray
Cold idols, scarcely human.
And if she thought of ease and rest,
Of love that spells God's name the best,
Her few friends heard but one request—
"Pray for a tired little woman."

She sat from dawn till weary dusk.
Her hands plied on—with but a husk
Of bread to break
And for Christ's sake
To bless: was He not human?
Then when the light would leave her brush
She'd sit there still, in the dim hush,
And say aloud, lest tears should rush—
"Pray for a tired little woman."

They found her so—one morning when
A knock brought no sweet welcome ken
Of her still face
And cloistral grace
And brow so bravely human.
They found her by the window bar,
Her eyes fixed where had been some star.
O you that rest, where'er you are,
Pray for the tired little woman.

WANDA

"She shall be sportive as the fawn
That wild with glee across the lawn
Or up the mountain springs;"

I'm Wanda born
Of the mirthful morn
So I heard the red-buds whisper
To the forest beech,
Tho I know that each
Is but a gossipy lisper.

I taunt the brook
With his hair outshook
O'er the weir so cool and mossy,
And mock the crow
As he peers below
With a caw that's vain and saucy.

Where the wahoo reds
And the sumac spreads
Tall plumes o'er the purple privet,
I beg a kiss
Of the wind, tho I wis
Right well he never will give it.

I hide in the nook
And sunbeams look
For me everywhere, like fairies.
Then out I glide
By the gray deer's side—
Ha, ha, but he never tarries!

Then I fright the hare
From his turfy lair
And after him send a volley
Of song that stops
Him under the copse
In wonderment at my folly.

And Autumn cries
"Be sad!" or sighs
Thro her nun lips palely pouting.
But then I leap
To the woods and keep
It wild with gleeing and shouting.

And when the sun
Has almost spun
A path to his far Golconda,
I climb the hill
And listen, still,
While he calls me—"Wanda! Wanda!"

And then I go
To the valley—Oh,
My dreams are sweeter than dreaming!
All night I play
Over lands of Fay,
In delight that seems not seeming.

IN A STORM

(To a Petrel)

All day long in the spindrift swinging,
Bird of the sea! bird of the sea!
How I would that I had thy winging—
How I envy thee!

How I would that I had thy spirit,
So to careen, joyous to cry,
Over the storm and never fear it!
Into the night that hovers near it!
Calm on a reeling sky!

All day long, and the night, unresting!
Ah! I believe thy every breath
Means that Life's Best comes ever breasting
Peril and pain and death!

ANTAGONISTS

I

Life flung to Art this voice, of mercy bare.
"Fool, to my human earth come you, so free,
To wreathe with phantom immortality
Whoever climbs with passionate lone care
That shifting, feverous and shadow stair
To Beauty—which is vainer than the sea
On furious thirst, or than a mote to Me
Who fill yon infinite great Everywhere?
Let them alone—my children! they are born
To mart and soil and saving commerce o'er
Wind, wave and many-fruited continents.
And you can feed them but of crumbs and scorn,
And futile glory when they are no more.
Within my hand alone is recompense!"

II

But Art made fierce reply, "Anathema,
On you who fill flesh but the spirit scorn.
Who give it to the unrequiting law
Of your brute soullessness and heart unborn
To aught than barter in your low bazaar—
Though Beauty die for it from star to star.
You are the god of Judas and those who
Betrayed Him unto nail and thorn and sword!
Of that relentless worm-bit Florence horde
Who drove lone Dante from them till he grew
So great in death they begged his bones to strew
Their pride and wealth and useless praise upon.
Anathema! I cry; and will, till none
Of all earth's children still shall worship you."

SEEDS

A thousand years
In a mummy's hand
A seed may lie.
Then, planted, spring
Into life again
Under sun and sky.

A thousand days
In a soul's dark ways
A word may wait.
But a touch at length
May arouse its strength
And the word proves—Fate.

WORLD-SORROW

(The Cry of the Modern)

World-sorrow have I known, like unto God.
Nothing there is of pain but echoes down
My breast with wan reverberance and pang,
And peaceless passes thro it evermore.
The struck bird's cry wounds my all-feeling blood
To pity that will not be solacèd,
Sounds on me like far pleas of the unborn
Against predestined days. A withering bud
Brews barrenness thro all the verdancy
Of Spring. And in a tear—tho anguish shape it
On the warm lid of joy—earth's Tragedy,
Whose curtain falls not for it has no end,
Comes mirrored to me as infinite Ill.

How shall I 'scape it! How, O how escape
The trooping of prayers lost upon the void,
Of hopes misborn and fading not to rest!
How shall I burn not with all vain-lit loves
That alway billow thro me their slow fire
Fed by the agony of new-broke hearts!
How loose me from too long commisery
For those whom unrequiting Time has given
To the altar of the aching world's unrest!
A grief immitigable to the Hand
Whose mystery of returning sun can heal
Winter away, seems here; a grief but calm
Of immortality can make forgiven!

For even as all the gleaming girth of stars
That wreathe the Illimitable beauteously
Quench not the vast of night, so do all joys
Life strews along her passing to the grave
Prevail not o'er the shadow of sure death.
And O Humanity, long-suffering Harp
Of passion-strings unnumbered, shall His skill
Flung thus forever o'er thy fragile rest
Build but these harmonies that seem sometimes
Unworth the misery of the trampled worm?
Would, would I were not vibrant with all strains
He strikes from thee, or else more perfect tuned!
World-sorrow have I known, like unto God.

THE SOUL'S RETURN

Let me lie here—
I care not for the distant hills today,
And the blue sphere
Of far infinity that draws away
All to its deep,
Would only sweep
Soothing the farther from me with its sway.

Let me lie here—
Gazing with vacant sadness on this weed.
The cricket near
Will utter all my heart can bear to heed.
Another voice
Would swell the noise
And surge, that ever sound in human need.

Let me lie here:
For now, so long my wasted soul has tossed
On the wide Mere
Of Mystery Hope's wing alone has crossed,
I ask no more
Than to restore
To simple things the wonder they have lost.

BIRTHRIGHT

(To A. H. R.)

My own, among the unnumbered years
God casts from that full Garner which
Is His Eternity one shall
Be ours, beyond all fate or fears.

For, ranging lone amid its thorns.
Seeking the buds that grew between,
We met and made its morning seem
New in a world grown old to morns.

And so tho He may scatter still
Many a fadeless other round,
In none, for us shall there be found
That first awakening and thrill.

But as in peace we tread Love's Land,
To which it gave us right of birth,
We shall remember that New Earth
Came when we first walked hand in hand.

ROMANCE

(To A. H. R. on North Cliff, Lynton, Devon)

White-caps hurry to meet the shore
An hundred fathoms down.
Gray sails are shimmering on the wind
Far out from Lynmouth town.

High crags above us are whispering keen,
The heather and the ling
Laugh to the sky as driven by
The wild gulls cry or cling.

And, where the far sun like a god
Scatters the mist, lies Shore.
Is it Romance's magic realm
Spring reigns forever o'er?

Romance that our morning hearts could see
Across the darkest foam?
Then do we know it well, my love,
Because it is our Home.

ON THE ATLANTIC

(To A. H. R.)

Who stood upon that schooner's driven deck
Last night as reefed and shuddering she hove
Into the twilight and all desperate drove
From wave to angrier wave that sought her wreck?
Who labored at her helm and watched the wind
Stagger the sea with all his stunning might,
Until in dimness dwindling from our sight
She vanished in the wrack that rode behind?
We know not, you and I, but our two souls
That followed as storm-petrels o'er the waves
Felt all the might of Him who sinks or saves,
And all the pity of earth's unreached goals.
Felt all—then swift returning to our love
Dwelt in its peace, uplifted safe above.

BY A SILENT STREAM

To sit by a silent stream,
Watching water-lilies dream:
While breezes winnow
The floating seeds,
And the aery minnow
Weaves his wavy web among the reeds.

Where a fallen sycamore
Whitely arches a pathway o'er,
And shadows darkle
The lambent cool,
As, softly a-sparkle.
Sunbeams arrow lightnings thro the pool.

Where the everlasting's breath
Odors mysteries of death.
Where iron-weeds, rusted
Leaf and pod,
By insects dusted,
Rustle—then in autumn sadness nod.

To sit ... till every sense
Lose thought of whither and whence;
Till earth and heaven
And faith and fate
No longer leaven
Life, with hope or fear, or love or hate.

THE GREAT BUDDHA OF KAMAKURA TO THE SPHINX

Grave brother of the burning sands,
Whose eyes enshrine forever
The desert's soul, are you not worn
Of gazing outward to dim strands
Of stars that weary never?

Infinity no answer has
For Time's untold distresses.
Its deepest maze of mystery
Is but Illusion built up as
The blind build skies—with guesses.

Nor has Eternity a place
On any starry summit.
The winds of Death are wide as Life,
And leave no world untouched—but race,
And soon with Night benumb it.

And Karma is the law of soul
And star—yea, of all Being.
And from it but one way there is.
Retreat into that trancèd Whole—
Which is not Sight nor Seeing;

Which is not Mind nor Mindlessness,
Nor Deed nor driven Doer,
Nor Want nor Wasting of Desire;
But only that which won can bless;
And of all else is pure.

Turn then your eyes from the far track
Of worlds, and gazing inward,
O brother, fare where Life has come,
Yea, into its far Whence fare back.
All other ways are sinward.

NECROMANCE

Can heedless gazing teach me more than toil?
Can swaying of sere sedge along the slope,
Or the dull lisp of oaken limbs that foil
The sun's ensheathing fervor, interfuse
My vacant being with far meanings whose
Soft airs blow from the hidden seas of Hope?
Or can the wintry sumac sably stooping
So charm and lift my heart from heartless drooping
When other healings all were asked in vain?
Yes—there are witcheries in the things of earth
That breathe with an illimitable voice
Wisdom and calm to us, and lure to birth
Dim intimations bidding us rejoice
Even in the great mystery of Pain.

LOOK NOT TO THE WEST

Look not to the west where the sun is dying
On fields of darkening clouds!
Look not to the west where the wild birds nest
And the winds are hieing
To sweep away sleep from the forest,
And tatter the shrouds of sable silence
Lit by the fire-fly's morris-dance.
Look not to the west—
'Tis best for the heart to hear not the chants
Of Evening over day's death!

Look not to the west where the sun is dying—
The sun that rose with song!
Look not to the west where the closèd quest
Of thy soul seems lying;
Where every sorrow that ever
Was wed with wrong in human breast,
From the sea of its radiance never fades!
Look not to the west—
'Tis best for the heart to see not the shades
That rise—the wrecks of the Past!

A NIKKO SHRINE

Under the sway, in old Japan,
Of silent cryptic trees,
There is a shrine the worldliest
Would near with bended knees.

Green, thro a torii, the way
Leads to it, worn, across
A rivulet whose voice intones
With mystery of moss.

A mystery that is everywhere:
The god beneath his shrine
Seems but a mossy shape—yet so
Ensheathed is more divine.

For tho Nature has muffled him
And sealed him there away,
The meaning of all faith remains—
That men will ever pray.

Aye will, as long as soul has need,
As long as earth is sod
With tombs, bow down the knee to all
That wakens in them God.

THE QUESTION

I shall lie so one day,
With lips of Silence set;
Eyes that no tear can wet
Again: a thing of Clay.

I shall lie so, and Earth
Will seize again her dust—
Though she must gnaw and rust
The coffin's iron girth.