Betrayal

Here lies the woven garb he wore
Of grass he gathered by the shore
Whereon the phantom waves still fret and foam
And sigh along the visionary sand.
“Where is he now?” you cry. “What desolate land
Gleams round him in dull mockery of home?”

You knew him by the robe he cast
About him, grey and worn at last.
“It fades,” you murmur, “changes, lives and dies.
Why has he vanished? Whither is he fled?
And is there any light among the dead?
Can any dream come singing where he lies?”

Ah peace! lift up your clouded eyes,
Nor where this curious relic lies
Grope in the blown dust for the print of feet.
Dim, twittering, ghastly sounds are these; but he
Laughs now as ever, still aloof and free,
Eager and wild and passionate and fleet.

Because he h...

He rode along one splendid noon,
When all the hills were lit with Spring,
And through the bushland throbbed a croon
Of every living, hopeful thing.

Between his teeth a rose he bore
As white as milk, and passing there
He tossed it with a laugh. I wore
It as it fell among my hair.

No day a-drip with golden rain,
No heat with drench of wattle scent
Can touch the heart of me again
But with that young, sweet wonder blent.

We wed upon a gusty day,
When baffled fury whipped the sea;
And now I love the swift, wet play
Of wind and rain besetting me.

I took white roses in my hand,
A white rose on my forehead shone,
For we had come to understand
White roses bloomed for us alone.

When scarce a year had gone he sped
To...

So, thou hast the art, good dame, thou swearest,
    To keep Time's perishing touch at bay
From the roseate splendour of the cheek so tender,
    And the silver threads from the gold away.
And the tell-tale years that have hurried by us
    Shall tip-toe back, and, with kind good-will,
They shall take the traces from off our faces,
    If we will trust to thy magic skill.

Thou speakest fairly; but if I listen
    And buy thy secret, and prove its truth,
Hast thou the potion and magic lotion
    To give me also the HEART of youth?
With the cheek of rose and the eye of beauty,
    And the lustrous looks of life's lost prime,
Wilt thou bring thronging each hope and longing
    That made the glory of that dead Time?

When the sap in the trees sets young...

Occhi, piangete; accompagnate il core.

DIALOGUE BETWEEN THE POET AND HIS EYES.


    Playne ye, myne eyes, accompanye my harte,
For, by your fault, lo, here is death at hand!
Ye brought hym first into this bitter band,
And of his harme as yett ye felt no part;
But now ye shall: Lo! here beginnes your smart.
Wett shall you be, ye shall it not withstand
With weepinge teares that shall make dymm your sight,
And mystic clowdes shall hang still in your light.
Blame but yourselves that kyndlyd have this brand,
With suche desyre to strayne that past your might;
But, since by you the hart hath caught his harme,
His flamèd heat shall sometyme make you warme.

HARRINGTON.


P.    Weep, wretched eyes, accompany the heart
     ...

(Moon Poems for the Children/Fairy-tales for the Children)

    Oh, once I walked a garden
    In dreams.    'Twas yellow grass.
    And many orange-trees grew there
    In sand as white as glass.
    The curving, wide wall-border
    Was marble, like the snow.
    I walked that wall a fairy-prince
    And, pacing quaint and slow,
    Beside me were my pages,
    Two giant, friendly birds.
    Half-swan they were, half peacock.
    They spake in courtier-words.
    Their inner wings a chariot,
    Their outer wings for flight,
    They lifted me from dreamland.
    We bade those trees good-night.
    Swiftly above the stars we rode.
    I looked below me soon.
    The white-walled garden I had ruled
    Was one lone flower - the moon.

Weeds and dead leaves, and leaves the Autumn stains
With hues of rust and rose whence moisture weeps;
Gnarl'd thorns, from which the knotted haw-fruit rains
On paths the gray moss heaps.

One golden flower, like a dreamy thought
In the sad mind of Age, makes bright the wood;
And near it, like a fancy Childhood-fraught,
The toadstool's jaunty hood.

Webs, in whose snares the nimble spiders crouch,
Waiting the prey that comes, moon-winged, with night:
Slugs and the snail which trails the mushroom's pouch,
That marks the wood with white.

An old gaunt house, round which the trees decay,
Its porches fallen and its windows gone,
Starts out at you as if to bar the way,
Or bid you hurry on.

A picket fence, grim as a skeleton arm,
Is flung ar...

Struggle not with thy life! - the heavy doom
    Resist not, it will bow thee like a slave:
Strive not! thou shalt not conquer; to thy tomb
    Thou shalt go crushed, and ground, though ne'er so brave.

Complain not of thy life! - for what art thou
    More than thy fellows, that thou should'st not weep?
Brave thoughts still lodge beneath a furrowed brow,
    And the way-wearied have the sweetest sleep.

Marvel not at thy life! - patience shall see
    The perfect work of wisdom to her given;
Hold fast thy soul through this high mystery,
    And it shall lead thee to the gates of heaven.

Our King went forth on pilgrimage
His prayers and vows to pay
To them that saved our heritage
And cast their own away.

And there was little show of pride,
Or prows of belted steel,
For the clean-swept oceans every side
Lay free to every keel.

And the first land he found, it was shoal and banky ground,
Where the broader seas begin,
And a pale tide grieving at the broken harbour-mouth
Where they worked the death-ships in.

And there was neither gull on the wing,
Nor wave that could not tell
Of the bodies that were buckled in the life-buoy's ring
That slid from swell to swell.

All that they had they gave, they gave; and they shall not return,
For these are those that have no grave where any heart may mourn.

And the next land...

A troubadour he played
Without a castle wall,
Within, a hapless maid
Responded to his call.

"Oh, willow, woe is me!
Alack and well-a-day!
If I were only free
I'd hie me far away!"

Unknown her face and name,
But this he knew right well,
The maiden's wailing came
From out a dungeon cell.

A hapless woman lay
Within that dungeon grim
That fact, I've heard him say.
Was quite enough for him.

"I will not sit or lie,
Or eat or drink, I vow.
Till thou art free as I,
Or I as pent as thou."

Her tears then ceased to flow,
Her wails no longer rang,
And tuneful in her woe
The prisoned maiden sang:

"Oh, stranger, as you play
I recognize your touch;
And all that I can say
Is, thank you ...

How comes it that, at even-tide,
When level beams should show most truth,
Man, failing, takes unfailing pride
In memories of his frolic youth?

Venus and Liber fill their hour;
The games engage, the law-courts prove;
Till hardened life breeds love of power
Or Avarice, Age's final love.

Yet at the end, these comfort not
Nor any triumph Fate decrees
Compared with glorious, unforgot
Ten innocent enormities

Of frontless days before the beard,
When, instant on the casual jest,
The God Himself of Mirth appeared
And snatched us to His heaving breast

And we not caring who He was
But certain He would come again
Accepted all He brought to pass
As Gods accept the lives of men...

Then He withdrew from sight and speech,

[From Farmer Harrington's Calendar.]


APRIL 25, 18 - .

        RAIN - rain - rain - for three good solid fluid weeks -
        Till the air swims, and all creation leaks!
        And street-cars furnish still less room to spare,
        And hackmen several times have earned their fare.
        The omnibuses lumber through the din,
        And carry clay outside as well as in;
        The elevated trains, with jerky care,
        Haul half-way comfort through the dripping air;
        The gutters gallop past the liquid scene,
        As brisk as meadow brooks, though not so clean;
        What trees the city keeps for comfort's sake,
        Are shedding tears as if their hearts would break;
        And water tries to get, by storming steady,

For your letter, dear - [Hattie], accept my best thanks,
Rendered long and amusing by virtue of franks,
Though concise they would please, yet the longer the better,
The more news that's crammed in, more amusing the letter,
All excuses of etiquette nonsense I hate,
Which only are fit for the tardy and late,
As when converse grows flat, of the weather they talk,
How fair the sun shines - a fine day for a walk,
Then to politics turn, of Burdett's reformation,
One declares it would hurt, t'other better the nation,
Will ministers keep? sure they've acted quite wrong,
The burden this is of each morning-call song.
So - is going to - you say,
I hope that success her great efforts will pay [ - ]
That [the Colonel] will see her, be dazzled outright,
And declare he can't bear...

This is the path he used to take,
That ended at a rose-porched door:
He takes it now for oldtime's sake;
And love of yore.

The blue mertensia, by the stone,
Lifts questioning eyes, that seem to say,
'Why is it now you walk alone
On this dim way?"

And then a wild bird, from a bough,
Out of his heart the answer takes:
"He walks alone with memory now
And heart that breaks.

"And Loss and Longing, witches, who
Usurp the wood and change to woe
The dream of happiness he knew
Long, long ago.

"The faery princess, from whose gaze
The blue mertensia learned that look,
Retaining still beside these ways
The joy it took."

He listens, conscious of no part
In wildwood question and reply
The wood, from out its mighty ...

Roses are sweet to smell and see,
And lilies on the stem;
But rarer, stranger buds there be,
And she was like to them.

The little moon that April brings,
More lovely shade than light,
That, setting, silvers lonely hills
Upon the verge of night -

Close to the world of my poor heart
So stole she, still and clear;
Now that she's gone, O dark, and dark,
The solitude, the fear.

They had long met o' Zundays her true love and she -
And at junketings, maypoles, and flings;
But she bode wi' a thirtover uncle, and he
Swore by noon and by night that her goodman should be
Naibour Sweatley a gaffer oft weak at the knee
From taking o' sommat more cheerful than tea -
Who tranted, and moved people's things.

She cried, "O pray pity me!" Nought would he hear;
Then with wild rainy eyes she obeyed.
She chid when her Love was for clinking off wi' her.
The pa'son was told, as the season drew near
To throw over pu'pit the names of the peair
As fitting one flesh to be made.

The wedding-day dawned and the morning drew on;
The couple stood bridegroom and bride;
The evening was passed, and when midnight had gone
The folks horned out, "God save...

All night I lay on Devil's Edge,
Along an overhanging ledge
Between the sky and sea:
And as I rested 'waiting sleep,
The windless sky and soundless deep
In one dim, blue infinity
Of starry peace encompassed me.

And I remembered, drowsily,
How 'mid the hills last night I'd lain
Beside a singing moorland burn;
And waked at dawn, to feel the rain
Fall on my face, as on the fern
That drooped about my heather-bed;
And how by noon the wind had blown
The last grey shred from out the sky,
And blew my homespun jacket dry,
As I stood on the topmost stone
That crowns the cairn on Hawkshaw Head,
And caught a gleam of far-off sea;
And heard the wind sing in the bent
Like those far waters calling me:
When, my heart answering to the call,
...

The splendors of a southern sun
    Caress the glowing sky;
O'er crested waves, the colors glance
    And gleaming, softly die.
A gentle calm from heaven falls
    And weaves a mystic spell;
A glowing grace that charms the soul--
    Whose glory none can tell.

Oh, warm sweet treasures of a sun
    Of endless fire and love;
Those dying embers are the flames
    From heavenly fires above.
Unto the water's edge they creep
    And bathe the seas in red;
Then die like shadows on the deep
    With glory cold and dead.

A ship--a lone, dark wanderer
    Upon the southern seas,
Speeds like a white-faced messenger
    Before the dying breeze.
Her masts are tipped with amethyst,
    A splendor all untold;
A crimson mantle wraps h...

I thought to die that night in the solitude where they would never find me...
But there was time...
And I lay quietly on the drawn knees of the mountain, staring into the abyss...
I do not know how long...
I could not count the hours, they ran so fast
Like little bare-foot urchins - shaking my hands away...
But I remember
Somewhere water trickled like a thin severed vein...
And a wind came out of the grass,
Touching me gently, tentatively, like a paw.

As the night grew
The gray cloud that had covered the sky like sackcloth
Fell in ashen folds about the hills,
Like hooded virgins, pulling their cloaks about them...
There must have been a spent moon,
For the Tall One's veil held a shimmer of silver...

That too I remember...
And the tenderly rock...