Kitabı oku: «The Cornflower, and Other Poems», sayfa 3

THE HARBOR LIGHTS OF HOME

 
J. Thomas Gordon left home one day,
Left home for good and all —
A boy has a right to have his own way
When he's nearly six foot tall;
At least, this is what J. Thomas thought,
And in his own young eyes
There were very few people quite so good,
And fewer still quite so wise.
 
 
What! tie as clever a lad as he
Down to commonplace toil?
Make J. Thomas Gordon a farmer lad,
A simple son of the soil?
Not if he knew it – 'twould be a sin;
He wished to rise and soar.
For men like himself who would do and dare
Dame Fortune had much in store.
 
 
The world was in need of brains and brawn,
J. Thomas said modestly,
The clever young man was in great demand —
They would see what they would see.
He would make his mark in the busy world,
Some day the daily press
Would herald the glad news forth to the throng,
J. Thomas is a SUCCESS.
 
 
Then would the doubters and sceptics all
Say, with regret sincere,
"To think that we gave his hopes and his aims
But an unbelieving sneer!"
As for him, he would kiss his mother,
And give her wealth galore,
Shake the hand of his father – maybe —
Then back to the world once more.
 
 
With big ambition and high conceit
Was young J. Thomas filled;
The warning of friends and their arguments
His eloquence quickly stilled.
"You may go," said the irate father,
"I'll not urge you to stay;
You will learn your lesson, you headstrong fool,
Be glad to come back some day."
 
 
So J. Thomas Gordon left the farm,
As boys have done before,
And his mother began to count the hours
Till he would be home once more.
 
 
The father wearied as time went on —
Missed the boy from his side;
But all through the years the fond mother kept
Her love, her hope, and her pride.
With a mother's beautiful faith, she said:
"I know my boy will come
So wealthy, so honored, noble and great,
Proudly come marching home."
 
 
And ever she looked at eventide
Into the glowing west
For the dust of the carriage bringing her
The one that she loved the best.
Ah! how she longed to look on his face,
Her stalwart lad and true,
With his sunburned cheek, and his ruddy hair,
And his eyes so bright and blue.
 
 
To those who said 'twas cruel of him
Never a line to send,
She had but one answer, with eyes ashine:
"It will all come right in the end;
He's busy making a name and place,
And I must patient be
Till this clever, ambitious lad of mine
Finds time to come back to me."
 
 
Important and wealthy and famous,
Honored and wise and great!
But look you, who can that ragged tramp be,
Down there by the garden gate,
Pale as if hunger had pressed him sore,
Trembling because so weak,
Pushed on by his longing, held back by shame —
A tear on his poor pale cheek?
 
 
'Tis he! Had he come back rich and great
She'd have met him at the door,
But she's down the path with her arms outspread,
Because he has come back poor.
Gone, gone are her day-dreams sweet and fair —
Gone in the swift glad shock
Of folding a ragged tramp in her arms,
But love stands firm as a rock.
 
 
She rang the dinner bell long and loud,
The father came with speed;
The welcome he gave the prodigal
Was a tender one indeed.
"The young fool has learned his lesson,"
J. Thomas whispered low.
"So he has – God bless him!" the father cried,
"He'll make a good man, I know.
 
 
"Honest, unselfish, and true as steel,
Our boy will stand the test;
Kindly of thought and word and deed —
The homely virtues are best.
I knew when you went, and you know it now,
That all this pride and style,
This yearnin' to fill up the public eye,
Isn't really worth the while."
 
 
Oh, the happy face of the mother
That night as, kneeling low,
Tom said the prayer that he used to say
At her knee so long ago.
A new J. Thomas had this to add —
With his bonnie blue eyes wet —
"Thank God for the home, for the faithful hearts
That never change or forget."
 
 
Though far and wide on the world's rough sea
The children, reckless, roam,
The boldest thanks God in some stress of storm
For the harbor lights of home.
 

THE PREACHER DOWN AT COLES

 
He was not especially handsome, he was not especially smart,
A great big lumbering fellow with a soft and tender heart.
His eyes were gray and honest, his smile a friendly one,
He wore his parson's suit of black on days of state alone;
At other times he went around in clothes the worse of wear,
A blue cloth cap set jauntily upon his thick gray hair.
He cared so little how he looked, so little how he drest,
That he tired the patience sorely of the ones he loved the best.
For a preacher, so they argued, should be dressed like one, of course,
But in the winter it was tweeds, in summer it was worse;
Ducks and flannels would be grimy, if the sad truth must be told,
For he spaded up the gardens of the people who were old,
And he ran down dusty highways at unministerial rate,
Going errands for the people who really could not wait.
His coat-sleeves would be short an inch, his trousers just the same,
For the washerwoman had them every week that ever came.
He cared so little how he looked, and never paused to think
That linen, duck, and flannel were such awful things to shrink.
 
 
His wife, she was the primmest thing, as neat as any doll,
And looked like one when walking by her husband big and tall.
It almost broke her heart that he refused to give a thought
To how he looked, or do the thing, or say the thing he ought.
Sometimes, though well she loved him, quite high her temper ran,
For 'tis hard on any woman to have such a careless man.
 
 
Think! when the conference president came visiting the place,
The preacher down at Coles he had a badly battered face —
One eye was black as black could be; he looked, so we've been told,
More like a fierce prize-fighter than a shepherd of the fold.
"How did it happen?" questioned him the visitor so wise,
With hint of laughter on his lips, and in his twinkling eyes.
"Old Betty Brown," the preacher said – his wife broke in just here,
"A cross-grained spinster of the place who hates him, that is clear;
And never did a woman have a meaner tongue than hers —
The slighting things she says of him, the mischief that she stirs!"
"Fields have we," said the president, "in country and in town;
Believe me, Madam, most of them can boast a Betty Brown."
 
 
The preacher stroked his blackened eye, and laughed good-naturedly.
"She doesn't like me very well, but what of that?" said he.
"The other night I found the poor old creature sick in bed,
She 'didn't want no prayin' done,' she very quickly said,
So, seeing that she was so ill and worn she could not stir,
I thought with care and patience I could milk the cow for her.
I stroked old Spot caressingly, and placed my little can,
But Spot she knew, and I came home a sadder, wiser man."
 
 
The preacher down at Coles he was no orator at all,
But sick, and sad, and sinful were glad to have him call.
Not that he ever found a host of happy things to say;
In fact, as far as talking went, he might have stayed away.
But oh, the welcome that he got! I think his big right hand
Gave such a grip that all the rest they seemed to understand.
 
 
Some of the congregation would have liked a different man,
He couldn't hope to please them all – few ministers that can.
Once, at the district meeting, the good old farmer Bowles
Stood up and spoke his mind about the preacher down at Coles.
 
 
"There's not," he said, "you know it, too, a better man than he;
An' you fault-findin', carpin' folk – I say this reverently —
If the Lord 'd take an angel and gently turn him loose
To preach down here, do you suppose he'd please the hull caboose?
Not much! It's human nature to quarrel with what we've got,
An' this man is a better man than we deserve, a lot."
 
 
But he did preach curious sermons, just as dry as they could be,
And the old folks slumbered through them every Sabbath, peacefully;
But they all woke up the moment the singing would begin,
And not an ear was found too dull to drink the music in.
For though the preacher could not boast an orator's smooth tongue,
He could reach the people's heart-strings when he stood up there and sung.
 
 
O the wondrous power and sweetness of the voice that filled the place!
Everyone that heard it swelling grew the purer for a space.
And men could not choose but listen to the singer standing there,
Till their worldliness slipped from them, and their selfishness and care.
Mourners turned their eyes all misty from the crosses tall and white
Where their loved ones slumbered softly all the day and all the night;
Listening, faith rose triumphant over sorrow, loss, and pain,
Heaven was not a far-off country, they would meet their own again.
And the white-haired men and women wished the singing need not cease,
For they seemed to see the beauty of the longed for Land of Peace.
Upward soared that voice, and upward, with a sweetness naught could stem,
Till each dim eye caught the glory of the new Jerusalem.
 
 
He was such a curious fellow, the preacher down at Coles!
One winter day the word was brought to town by Farmer Bowles
That in a little shanty, in the hollow by the mill,
Were children gaunt with hunger, a mother sad and ill,
The father just a drunkard, a vagabond who left
His family for long, long weeks of love and care bereft.
The squire talked of taking a big subscription up,
And talked, and talked, while in that house was neither bite nor sup.
O, these talking folks! these talking folks! the poor would starve and freeze
If the succoring and caring were done by such as these.
 
 
The preacher down at Coles he had not very much to say;
He harnessed up the old roan horse and hitched it to the sleigh,
And piled in so much provisions that his wife said, tearfully,
She didn't have a cake or pie left in the house for tea.
He filled the sleigh with baskets, and with bundles – such a pile!
Heaps of wood, and clothes, and victuals – everybody had to smile
As they watched the old roan canter down the crossroad, o'er the hill,
To the little cheerless shanty in the hollow by the mill.
The preacher built a fire and bade the children warm their toes
While he heard the worn-out mother's tale of miseries and woes.
He brought in a bag of flour, and a turkey big and fat —
His dainty wife had meant to dine the Ladies' Aid on that.
He brought in ham and butter, and potatoes in a sack,
A pie or two, a loaf of cake, and doughnuts, such a stack!
Ah! his wife and her good handmaid had been baking many a day,
For the Ladies' Aid would dine there – he had lugged it all away.
He brought in a pair of blankets, and a heavy woollen quilt;
Betty Brown, who happened in there, said she thought that she would wilt,
For these things the active members of the Missionary Band
Had gathered for the heathen in a far-off foreign land.
"These belong unto the Lord, sir," Betty said, "I think you'll find."
But he answered her quite gently, "Very well, He will not mind."
"To see him making tea for the woman in the bed
Made me wish I had been kinder to the preacher," Betty said.
Though he was so big and clumsy he could step around so light,
And to see him getting dinner to the children's huge delight!
It was not till he had warmed them, and had fed them there, that day,
That he whispered very softly: "Little children, let us pray."
Then he gave them to the keeping of a Father kind and wise
In a way that brought the tear-drops into hard old Betty's eyes.
She felt an aching in her throat, and when she cried, "Amen!"
Other folks might flout the preacher, Betty never would again.
 
 
He took up the fresh air movement, but the people down at Coles
Shook their head – a preacher's work, they said, was saving precious souls,
Not worrying lest the waifs and strays that throng the city street
Should pine for want of country air, and country food to eat.
Lawyer Angus, at the meeting, spoke against new-fangled things;
"Seems to me our preacher's bow, friends, has a muckle lot of strings."
Merchant Jones said trade was failing, rent was high and clerks to pay;
Not a dollar could he give them, he was very grieved to say.
Old Squire Hays was buying timber, needed every cent and more;
Doctor Blake sat coldly smiling – then the farmer took the floor.
 
 
"Wish," he said, "our hearts were bigger, an' our speeches not so long;
I would move right here the preacher tunes us up a little song."
Sing? I wish you could have heard him – simple songs of long ago,
Old familiar things that held us – warm that golden voice and low —
Songs of summer in the woodlands, cowslips yellow in the vale;
Songs of summer in the city, and the children wan and pale,
Till we saw the blist'ring pavement pressed by tired little feet,
Heard the baby voices crying for the meadows wide and sweet.
 
 
"Now we'll take up the collection," said the wily farmer Bowles,
And they showered in their money, did the people down at Coles.
"Here's a cheque," said lawyer Angus, "'tis the best that I can do;
Man, you'd have us in the poorhouse if you sang your sermons through!"
 
 
The very careless fellow still goes his cheery way
Unmindful of what people think or of what people say.
Some still are finding fault with him – he doesn't mind it much —
Laughs when they make remarks about his clothes and shoes and such,
Declare his sermons have no point, and quarrel with his text,
As people will, but oh, it makes his pretty wife so vext!
"I think," she says, "as much of him as any woman can,
But 'tis most aggravating to have such a careless man."
 
 
There are those who think him perfect, shout his praises with a will.
He has labored for the Master, he is laboring for Him still;
And the grumbling does not move him, nor the praises sung abroad —
Things like these seem only trifles to the man who works for God.
Farmer Bowles summed up the total in his own original way
When he spoke at the Convention that was held the other day.
"Never knew a better worker, never knew a kinder man;
Lots of preachers are more stylish, keep themselves so spic-and-span
You could spot 'em out for preachers if you met 'em walkin' round
Over on the Fejee Islands, silk hat, long coat, I'll be bound.
Our man's different, but, I tell you, when it comes to doing good
There's not one can beat him at it, an' I want this understood.
Ask the sad folks and the sinful, ask the fallen ones he's raised,
Ask the sick folks and the poor folks, if you want to hear him praised.
Orator? Well, maybe not, friends, but in caring for men's souls
There stand few men half so faithful as the preacher down at Coles."
 

CHORE TIME

 
When I'm at gran'dad's on the farm,
I hear along 'bout six o'clock,
Just when I'm feelin' snug an' warm,
"Ho, Bobby, come and feed your stock."
 
 
I jump an' get into my clothes;
It's dark as pitch, an' shivers run
All up my back. Now, I suppose
Not many boys would think this fun.
 
 
But when we get out to the barn
The greedy pigs begin to squeal,
An' I throw in the yellow corn,
A bushel basket to the meal.
 
 
Then I begin to warm right up,
I whistle "Yankee Doodle" through,
An' wrastle with the collie pup —
And sometimes gran'dad whistles too.
 
 
The cow-shed door, it makes a din
Each time we swing it open wide;
I run an' flash the lantern in,
There stand the shorthorns side by side.
 
 
Their breathin' makes a sort of cloud
Above their heads – there's no frost here.
"My beauties," gran'dad says out loud,
"You'll get your breakfasts, never fear."
 
 
When up I climb into the loft
To fill their racks with clover hay,
Their eyes, all sleepy like and soft,
A heap of nice things seem to say.
 
 
The red ox shakes his curly head,
An' turns on me a solemn face;
I know he's awful glad his shed
Is such a warm and smelly place.
 
 
An' last of all the stable big,
With harness hanging on each door,
I always want to dance a jig
On that old musty, dusty floor.
 
 
It seems so good to be alive,
An' tendin' to the sturdy grays,
The sorrels, and old Prince, that's five —
An' Lightfoot with her coaxing ways.
 
 
My gran'dad tells me she is mine,
An' I'm that proud! I braid her mane,
An' smooth her sides until they shine,
An' do my best to make her vain.
 
 
When we have measured oats for all,
Have slapped the grays upon the flanks,
An' tried to pat the sorrels tall,
An' heard them whinny out their thanks,
 
 
We know it's breakfast time, and go
Out past the yellow stacks of straw,
Across the creek that used to flow,
But won't flow now until a thaw.
 
 
Behind the trees the sky is pink,
The snow drifts by in fat white flakes,
My gran'dad says: "Well, Bob, I think
There comes a smell of buckwheat cakes."
 

A BOY'S TRIALS

 
When I was but a little lad
One thing I could not bear,
It was to stand at mother's knee
And have her comb my hair.
 
 
They didn't keep boys' hair as short
As it's kept now-a-days,
And mine was always tangled up
In twenty different ways.
 
 
I'd twist my mouth and grit my teeth,
And say it wasn't fair —
It was a trial, and no mistake,
When mother combed my hair.
 
 
She'd brush and brush each stubborn curl
That grew upon my pate,
And with her scissors nip and clip
To make the edges straight.
 
 
Then smooth it down until it shone,
While I would grin and bear,
And feel a martyr through and through,
When mother combed my hair.
 
 
She'd take my round chin in her hand
And hold it there the while
She made the parting carefully,
Then tell me with a smile:
 
 
"Don't push your cap down on your curls
And spoil my work and care;
He is a pretty little lad
When mother combs his hair."
 
 
I'd hurry out and rumple up
That mop of hair so thick —
A vandal, I, for she had worked
So hard to make it slick —
 
 
And wish I were a grown-up man
So nobody would dare
To put a washrag in my ears,
Or comb my tangled hair.
 
 
Heigho! now that I'm bald and gray,
Methinks I would be glad
To have her smooth my brow and cheeks,
And whisper, "Mother's lad!"
 
 
A longing for the care-free days
Doth take me unaware;
To stand, a boy, at mother's knee
And have her comb my hair.
 

AN APRIL FOOL OF LONG AGO

 
In powdered wig and buckled shoe,
Knee-breeches, coat and waistcoat gay,
The wealthy squire rode forth to woo
Upon a first of April day.
 
 
He would forget his lofty birth,
His spreading acres, and his pride,
And Betty, fairest maid on earth,
Should be his own – his grateful bride.
 
 
The maid was young, and he was old;
The maid was good to look upon.
Naught cared she for his land or gold,
Her love was for the good squire's son.
 
 
He found her as the noonday hush
Lay on the world, and called her name.
She looked up, conscious, and her blush
A tender interest did proclaim.
 
 
For he was Hubert's sire, and she
To keep a secret tryst did go.
He said: "Methinks she cares for me" —
That April fool of long ago.
 
 
The flattered squire his suit did press
Without delay. "Say, wilt thou come,"
He said, with pompous tenderness,
"And share my wealth and grace my home?"
 
 
"Kind sir," the lovely Betty cried,
"I'm but a lass of low degree."
"The love that is controlled by pride
Is not true love at all," quoth he.
 
 
"I hold a man should woo and wed
Where'er he wills – should please himself."
"There is the barrier strong," she said,
"Of pedigree, and place, and pelf.
 
 
"Could one so lowly hope to grace
Your home?" Right proud his air and tone:
"You're pure of heart and fair of face;
Dear Betty, you would grace a throne!"
 
 
"Since you so highly think of me" —
Her tears and laughter were at strife —
"You will not mind so much, maybe,
That I am Hubert's promised wife."
 
 
Pale went the good squire's florid cheek,
His wrath flamed out – but Betty stood,
Brown-haired, red-lipped, blue-eyed and meek,
A sight to make a bad man good.
 
 
She won on him. "But why this guile —
This secrecy?" His voice was rough.
"We feared," she whispered, with a smile,
"You would not think me good enough."
 
 
"An April fool am I. Come, come —
My offer stands. As Hubert's wife,"
He laughed, "you'll share my wealth and home
And brighten up a lonely life."
 
 
He kissed her cheek and rode away.
Unbroken was his heart, I wist,
For he was thinking of a day —
A day back in youth's rosy mist —
 
 
And of a form and of a face.
"My dear, dead love," he whispered low,
The while he rode at sober pace,
That April fool of long ago.
 

FOR HE WAS SCOTCH, AND SO WAS SHE

 
They were a couple well content
With what they earned and what they spent,
Cared not a whit for style's decree —
For he was Scotch, and so was she.
 
 
And oh, they loved to talk of Burns —
Dear blithesome, tender Bobby Burns!
They never wearied of his song,
He never sang a note too strong.
One little fault could neither see —
For he was Scotch, and so was she.
 
 
They loved to read of men who stood
And gave for country life and blood,
Who held their faith so grand a thing
They scorned to yield it to a king.
Ah, proud of such they well might be —
For he was Scotch, and so was she.
 
 
From neighbors' broils they kept away;
No liking for such things had they,
And oh, each had a canny mind,
And could be deaf, and dumb, and blind.
With words or pence was neither free —
For he was Scotch, and so was she.
 
 
I would not have you think this pair
Went on in weather always fair,
For well you know in married life
Will come, sometimes, the jar and strife;
They couldn't always just agree —
For he was Scotch, and so was she.
 
 
But near of heart they ever kept,
Until at close of life they slept;
Just this to say when all was past,
They loved each other to the last!
They're loving yet, in heaven, maybe —
For he was Scotch, and so was she.