Kitabı oku: «Last Verses», sayfa 5

AN EVENING PRIMROSE

 
WHEN all the west is red at set of sun,
And cool airs waken which were hushed at noon,
And crickets chirr and trill, and one by one
The birds’ songs die away to sleepy croon,
And each white lily on the garden walk,
Dew-heavy, hangs its head upon its stalk;
 
 
When dawning soft and faint upon the blue,
The vague, mysterious, dreamy blue of night,
The first dim planet glimmers into view,
’Tis then it opens with a shy delight
Its pale gold, wayside blossoms near and far,
Holding them up to greet the evening star.
 
 
The freshness of the morning tempts it not,
Nor fervid noon, nor the warm wind’s caress;
It envies not the royal rose’s lot,
Choosing, as background for its loveliness,
The dewy shadows and the twilight lone;
Making the hush of eventide its own.
 
 
The blaze and sunshine of the summer hours
Know not nor prize the blooms they never see;
None of the jubilant and day-lit flowers
Hail it as sister, but the drowsy bee
And the night-moth, just roused from his repose,
They love it better than the fair, proud rose.
 
 
A type it seems of some shy human hearts,
Which palely shrink from joy and shun renown,
But when the sun grows colder and departs,
And the dim, hovering night shuts darkly down
And all the happy things which feed on day
Shiver and shrink and hide themselves away —
 
 
Then, like the primrose with its pale gold star,
They open sudden blooms of love and cheer,
Giving out fragrance where no others are,
Gilding the heavy hours of doubt and fear,
Fronting the shadows, till with dawn ends pain,
Then folding silently their buds again.
 

A ROSE IN A GLASS

 
ONLY a rose in a glass,
Set by a sick man’s bed;
The day was weary, the day was long,
But the rose it spoke with a voice like song,
And this is what it said:
 
 
“I know that the wind is keen,
And the drifted snows lie deep;
I know that the cruel ice lies spread
O’er the laughing brook and the lake’s blue bed,
And the fountain’s rush and leap.
 
 
“I know, I know all this;
Yet here I sit – a rose!
Smiling I sit, and I feel no fear,
For God is good and the Spring is near,
Couched in the shrouding snows.
 
 
“Canst thou not smile with me?
Art thou less strong than I?
Less strong at heart than a feeble flower
Which lives and blossoms but one brief hour,
And then must droop and die?
 
 
“Surely, thou canst endure
Thy little pains and fears,
Before whose eyes, all fair and bright,
In endless vistas of delight
Stretch the Eternal Years!”
 
 
Then over the sick man’s heart
Fell a deep and hushed repose.
He turned on his pillow and whispered low,
That only the listening flower might know:
“I thank thee, Rose, dear Rose.”
 

SNOWBOUND

 
IT looks so cold, this drifted snow,
So cruelly, deadly cold, and yet
The hidden bulbs and roots below
Deem it their friendliest coverlet.
 
 
Wrapped warmly in its fleecy veil
They hear, unshuddering where they lie,
The patter and the hiss of hail,
The angry storm-wind whirling by.
 
 
Above, the world is tempest-tossed;
Buried too deep for doubts and fears,
The detonations of the frost
Come dumbed and softened to their ears.
 
 
Sleeping, they smile as children do,
Secure of shield and covering,
And trust the Promise, proved and true,
The unforgetting pledge of spring.
 
 
Their veins a slumbering pulse informs,
The life within them stirs and grows,
And fed and sheltered so by storms,
They wait content beneath the snows.
 
 
Life has its storms; its hard, cold days,
When blasts of grief and frosts of care
Drift in upon the happy ways,
And blight the blooms that made them fair.
 
 
Cheerless we scan the wastes of white
Which seem of Hope the high-heaped grave,
Nor guess that hidden far from sight
Lie germs of joy, secure and brave;
 
 
And that, when comes God’s blessed spring,
(As surely it shall come at last
To every grieved and patient thing!)
And all the winter-time is past, —
 
 
And the snow melts, and hands unseen
Set buds and blossoms on each stem,
We shall note growths which had not been
If Sorrow had not sheltered them!
 

SHELTERED

“Fear no more the heat of the sun,

Nor the furious winter’s rages.”

 
THE piercing blast blows from the pole,
The panes are glazed with ice,
All etched and freaked in fairy lines,
With many a strange device;
The hard snow echoes underfoot
To tread of hurrying feet,
And every freezing breath is charged
With particles of sleet.
 
 
But thou, my darling, who till late
Endured the winter’s sting,
And faded yearly with the flowers,
And shared their suffering,
Out of the storm wind and the frost,
Like birds which southward soar,
From the chill world which hurt thee so
Hast flown forevermore.
 
 
In sheltered and eternal spring,
Where never cold wind blew,
Amid the all-contented saints,
Thou sittest, contented too.
The hard things are forgotten quite,
The heavenly rest is fair,
And we who shiver still on earth
Are glad that thou art there.
 

THE OLD PINE

 
UPON the lonely, wind-swept crest,
Where the hill-summit fronts the west,
Set like gaunt sentinels in row
To watch the seasons come and go,
In stalwart and unbending lines,
There stands a row of hoary pines.
 
 
Long have they stood, and much have seen,
Deer couched once in their coverts green,
The Indian paused his bow to string,
The wild cat crouched before its spring,
And from deep hollows far below
The wolf’s long howl rang o’er the snow.
 
 
Sleek kine and browsing sheep now stray
Where once was heard the wolves’ wild bay,
The red man fading slow made place
For an encroaching, stronger race,
And on the once lonely, rocky height
A church uprears its steeple white.
 
 
Scorning such human accidents,
Broadening their green circumference,
Each year made taller, statelier still,
The pine trees topped the wind-swept hill,
And surged responsive melodies
Like simulated sounds of seas.
 
 
Till yesterday their century long
Companionship held firm and strong,
Then a wild bolt of lightning sped
And smote their leader’s lofty head,
Plunging a ghastly deep-scarred line
Down the brown trunk of the old pine.
 
 
Still does he rear his head on high,
Still stanchly fronts the sun and sky,
Still do his needles in soft tunes
Make sea songs for the summer moons,
Veiling the deadly wound and blight;
But all the same he died last night.
 
 
For a brief space his stricken form
May bide the buffet of the storm,
While the deep rift within his heart
Widens and tears his trunk apart,
Then, with a crash from overhead,
He falls, and all men know him dead.
 
 
Ah, gallant heart, so firm to bear,
So resolute to face despair,
Hiding the grievous hurt away
Which saps thy being day by day,
And simulating with hard strife
The bearing and the look of life.
 
 
Patience is strong, and strong is faith,
But mightier still the power of death;
Thy flesh is weaker than thy pain,
Vain is the struggle, all in vain.
Heaven’s bolt of doom was surely sped,
And even to-day we count thee dead.
 

IN THE FOREFRONT

 
ONCE a small, childish dancing company,
We ran behind the ranks of older ones
Half seen, half noticed, very proud to be
Part of the grown procession with the drums;
Each manly stride they covered cost us three
Of our small steps, – that was small price to pay
For sharing in the glory of the day.
 
 
Where are the ranks that seemed to us so tall,
So full of fire and force and valor brave,
So full of wisest wisdom, knowing all
That man can know, or children dumbly crave
To understand with their weak powers, and small?
It seems a little time since thus we ran,
Yet we, the children then, now lead the van.
 
 
The stately forms which towered like forest trees,
The limbs which never tired, (as we supposed!)
The wills which ruled our infant destinies,
The strength beneath whose shadow we reposed,
Authority, love, shelter, – all of these,
Yielding like straws in tempest to the brunt
Of Time’s fierce wind, have left us in the front.
 
 
’Tis we who are the stalwart leaders now
(Or seem so to the little ones behind),
The tireless marchers whom the gods endow
With the keen vision, the all-judging mind,
The will, which questions not of why or how,
But rules and dominates all lesser fates,
Regardless of their puny loves or hates!
 
 
How strange it seems to lead, who once were led!
To feel the pressure of the quick young race
Following and urging on behind our tread,
Ready and eager to usurp our place,
Crowding us forward, – though no word be said!
’Tis but the natural law which stars obey,
Following in order due through night, through day.
 
 
O march which seemed so long and is so brief!
Whether by rough ways led or smooth greensward,
Under clear sun or hovering clouds of grief,
What matter, so they end in thee, O Lord!
Who art of mortal toils the full reward?
We will keep on content and fearlessly,
Nor seek for rest until we rest in Thee.
 

INTERRUPTED

 
I PLANNED a plan, and duly made
A plan to fill one little day.
Pleasure and toil were gauged and weighed,
This hour for work and that for play,
And each for each made room and way.
 
 
I set my wilful feet to tread
The wilful path self-chosen as right,
Resolved to walk unhinderèd,
Nor turn to left, nor turn to right,
Until the coming of the night.
 
 
But interruptions all day long,
And little vexing hindrances,
Each weak, but all together strong,
Came one by one to fret and tease,
And balk my purpose, and displease.
 
 
Friendship laid fetters on the noon,
And fate threw sudden burdens down,
And hours were short and strength failed soon,
And darkness came the day to drown,
Hope changed to grief and smile to frown.
 
 
Then I said sadly: “All is vain;
No use there is in planning aught,
Labor is wasted once again,
And wisdom is to folly brought,
And all the day has gone for naught.”
 
 
Then spoke a voice within my soul:
“The day was yours, and will was free,
And self was guide and self was goal,
Each hour was full as hour could be —
What space was left, my child, for Me?
 
 
“Where was the moment in your plan
For work of Mine which might not wait?
The need, the wish of fellow man,
The little threads of mutual fate
Which touch and tangle soon or late?
 
 
“These ‘hindrances’ which made you fret,
These ‘interruptions,’ one by one,
They were but sudden tasks I set,
My errands for your feet to run,
Will you disdain them, child, or shun?”
 
 
Oh, blind of heart and dull of soul!
I only felt, the long day through,
That I was thwarted of my goal,
And chafed rebelliously, nor knew
The Lord had aught for me to do!
 
 
Forgive me, Lord, my selfish day,
Touch my sealed eyes, and bid them wake
To see Thy tasks along the way,
Thy errands, which my hands may take,
And do them gladly for Thy sake.
 

SAINT CHRISTOPHER

 
NOT only in the legend does he stand
Beside the river current rushing fast,
A dim-drawn giant figure, strong and vast,
His staff within his hand;
 
 
But in our own day visible, beside
The darker stream of human pain and sin,
Our eyes have watched him, battling hard to win
For weaker souls a pathway through the tide.
 
 
Upheld by him and safely carried o’er
The waves which else had overwhelmed and drowned,
How many a faint and doubting heart hath found
Glad footing on the unhoped-for, distant shore!
 
 
And still as his strong, tireless arm again
And yet again their burden raised and took,
You read in the deep reverence of his look
He did the work for God and not for men.
 
 
Christophorus our saint, named now with tears.
The deeds he did were Christ’s, the words he said,
All his strong, vital, splendid strength he laid
At the Lord’s feet through the unstinting years.
 
 
And now beside that Lord in highest Heaven,
Past the dark stream of Death, which all must tread,
He rests secure, with joy upon his head,
And a “New Name” which hath to him been given.
 
 
But still to memory’s eye he stands the same,
A stalwart shape where the deep waters run,
Upbearing, aiding, strengthening every one,
Carrying them onward in his Lord’s dear name.
 

CONQUEROR

J. S. W

 
THE voice of Duty, low, but clarion clear,
Found her, safe seated in the golden haze
Of youth and ease, living luxurious days.
She roused to listen; her enchanted ear
Heard nevermore the music of the earth —
The dancing measure, or the reveler’s call,
Or flute note of Apollo, nor the fall
Of Orphic melodies. As nothing worth
She counted them; in vain her ear to please
They rang their varied changes, urged and wooed,
Following swift Duty, leader to all good,
She went thenceforward; – so she conquered Ease.
 
 
Then fell her tender feet on harder road,
With stones beset and briers and many a thorn;
And there, her woman’s strength all overborne,
She sank at length, fainting beneath her load.
And time went by, while helpless still she lay,
Shackled by weakness, vexed with hopes and fears,
Watching the long and tantalizing years
Built from the salt sands of her every day;
But still she bravely smiled through loss and gain;
Through the slow ebb of cheer and fortune’s frown,
Her quenchless soul no chilling waves could drown,
No fires exhaust; – and so she conquered Pain.
 
 
And, last, the dim, mysterious shape drew near,
Whom men name “Death,” with pale, averted eyes;
(But whom the Heavenly ones call otherwise!)
She met his hovering presence without fear.
Long time they strove; and as the Patriarch cried,
“Except thou bless, I will not let thee go”!
So she; until at dawn the vanquished foe
Utterly blessed, and left her satisfied.
Oh, sweet to her the first, long, rapturous breath
Of Heaven, after life’s pent and prisoning air;
Freedom unstinted, power to will and dare
The victory won from Life and over Death.
 

THE YEAR AND THE CENTURY

 
THE New Year came surrounded with Hope and Joy and Song,
And he smiled like dawning sunrise as he stood amid the throng.
The hopeful months they followed expectantly and slow;
But the Old Year went companionless, as all the Old Years go.
 
 
All sad and stern the Old Year went, along the unknown way;
His heart was full of bitterness, he had no word to say.
Then wonder seized upon his heart, for he was not alone;
A mighty shadow step by step was gliding by his own!
 
 
He turned to face a vast dark shape with eyes like clouded day,
And, “Who art thou, O wondrous one?” the Old Year, awed, did say.
“I am thy fellow pilgrim up the pathway of the sky;
Together bound, thou the dead year, I the dead century.”
 
 
The Old Year bared his forehead, and bent his feeble knee.
“I am unworthy of such grace, such august company.”
The other raised him gently. “Kneel not to me,” he said;
“The less, the larger, are as one when numbered with the dead.
 
 
“A hundred of thy fellows have gone to swell my tale;
A hundred centuries such as I, poured in the mighty scale
In which God swings eternity, shall count for nothing more
Than the dust borne by the wind away, the fleet foam on the shore.
 
 
“Centuries or years or cycles, we fleet and disappear;
But the Lord who is the source of time, and builds each growing year,
Abides. Within His sight you and I are shadows dim;
Yet He made us both, He loves us both, and now we go to Him.”
 
 
The Old Year shivered as he heard these words of lofty cheer;
Then light came to his faded eyes, and courage chased his fear.
He felt a strong hand clasp his own, and, held and guided so,
He went forth with the Century to where the dead Years go.