Betrayal

Who knows the heart of the Christian? How does he reason?
What are his measures and balances? Which is his season
For laughter, forbearance or bloodshed, and what devils move him
When he arises to smite us? I do not love him.
He invites the derision of strangers, he enters all places.
Booted, bareheaded he enters. With shouts and embraces
He asks of us news of the household whom we reckon nameless.
Certainly Allah created him forty-fold shameless!

So it is not in the Desert. One came to me weeping,
The Avenger of Blood on his track, I took him in keeping.
Demanding not whom he had slain, I refreshed him, I fed him
As he were even a brother. But Eblis had bred him.

He was the son of an ape, ill at ease in his clothing.
He talked with his head, hands and feet. I en...

When last we parted, thou wert young and fair
How beautiful let fond remembrance say!
Alas! since then old Time has stol'n away
Nigh forty years, leaving my temples bare:
So hath it perished, like a thing of air,
That dream of love and youth: we now are gray;
Yet still remembering youth's enchanted way,
Though time has changed my look, and blanched my hair,
Though I remember one sad hour with pain,
And never thought, long as I yet might live,
And parted long, to hear that voice again;
I can a sad, but cordial greeting, give,
And for thy welfare breathe as warm a prayer,
Lady, as when I loved thee young and fair!

In darkness the loud sea makes moan;
And earth is shaken, and all evils creep
About her ways.
Oh, now to know you sleep!
Out of the whirling blinding moil, alone,
Out of the slow grim fight,
One thought to wing, to you, asleep,
In some cool room that's open to the night
Lying half-forward, breathing quietly,
One white hand on the white
Unrumpled sheet, and the ever-moving hair
Quiet and still at length! . . .

Your magic and your beauty and your strength,
Like hills at noon or sunlight on a tree,
Sleeping prevail in earth and air.

In the sweet gloom above the brown and white
Night benedictions hover; and the winds of night
Move gently round the room, and watch you there.
And through the dreadful hours
The trees and waters and the hill...

What though his feet were shod with sharp, fierce flame,
And death and ruin were his daily squires,
The Scythian, helped by Heaven’s thunders, came:
The time was ripe for God’s avenging fires.
Lo! loose, lewd trulls, and lean, luxurious liars
Had brought the fair, fine face of Rome to shame,
And made her one with sins beyond a name
That queenly daughter of imperial sires!
The blood of elders like the blood of sheep,
Was dashed across the circus. Once while din
And dust and lightnings, and a draggled heap
Of beast-slain men made lords with laughter leap,
Night fell, with rain. The earth, so sick of sin,
Had turned her face into the dark to weep.

When o'er the street the morning peal is flung
From yon tall belfry with the brazen tongue,
Its wide vibrations, wafted by the gale,
To each far listener tell a different tale.
The sexton, stooping to the quivering floor
Till the great caldron spills its brassy roar,
Whirls the hot axle, counting, one by one,
Each dull concussion, till his task is done.
Toil's patient daughter, when the welcome note
Clangs through the silence from the steeple's throat,
Streams, a white unit, to the checkered street,
Demure, but guessing whom she soon shall meet;
The bell, responsive to her secret flame,
With every note repeats her lover's name.
The lover, tenant of the neighboring lane,
Sighing, and fearing lest he sigh in vain,
Hears the stern accents, as they come and go,

The day was o'er, and in their tent the weaned victors met,
In wine and social gaiety the carnage to forget.
The merry laugh and sparkling jest, the pleasant tale were there -
Each heart was free and gladsome then, each brow devoid of care.

Yet one was absent from the board who ever was the first
In every joyous, festive scene, in every mirthful burst;
He also was the first to dare each perilous command,
To rush on danger - yet was he the youngest of the band.

Upon the battle-field he lay a damp and fearful grave;
His right hand grasped the cherished flag - the flag he died to save;
While the cold stars shone calmly down on heaps of fallen dead,
And their pale light a halo cast round that fair sleeper's head.

Say, was there none o'er that young chief to shed one...

The Milk-and-Water School
Alas! she would not hear my prayer!
Yet it were rash to tear my hair;
Disfigured, I should be less fair.

She was unwise, I may say blind;
Once she was lovingly inclined;
Some circumstance has changed her mind.


The Strong-Minded or Matter-of-Fact School
Well! so my offer was no go!
She might do worse, I told her so;
She was a fool to answer "No".

However, things are as they stood;
Nor would I have her if I could,
For there are plenty more as good.


The Spasmodic or German School
Firebrands and Daggers! hope hath fled!
To atoms dash the doubly dead!
My brain is fire, my heart is lead!

Her soul is flint, and what am I?
Scorch'd by her fierce, relentless eye,
Nothingness is my d...

A blue line to the westward that surely is not cloud;
A green tinge in the waters; a clamorous bird-crowd;
Then far-off foamy edges, and hill-tops timber fringed;
And, perched aloft, a light-house, o’er grey cliffs golden-tinged.

O watchers leaning landward, know ye of nothing more?
And hear ye but the sea-birds? and see ye but the shore?
Nay, look awhile, and listen who bids you welcome there;
The great seas kiss her sandals, the high stars gem her hair!
Behold her in the gateway! high-held in either hand
A blazing beacon, lighted to lead you to the land.

“Now welcome, kindly welcome, who come to me for cheer!
My forts may frown on others, but ye have nought to fear.
The cannon’s flash and thunder are all for joy to-day,
No murmurs meet your coming, none wish to...

Thrice, and above, blest, my soul's half, art thou,
In thy both last and better vow;
Could'st leave the city, for exchange, to see
The country's sweet simplicity;
And it to know and practise, with intent
To grow the sooner innocent;
By studying to know virtue, and to aim
More at her nature than her name;
The last is but the least; the first doth tell
Ways less to live, than to live well:
And both are known to thee, who now canst live
Led by thy conscience, to give
Justice to soon-pleased nature, and to show
Wisdom and she together go,
And keep one centre; This with that conspires
To teach man to confine desires,
And know that riches have their proper stint
In the contented mind, not mint;
And canst instruct that those who have the itch
Of cravin...

The waterfall, deep in the wood,
Talked drowsily with solitude,
A soft, insistent sound of foam,
That filled with sleep the forest's dome,
Where, like some dream of dusk, she stood
Accentuating solitude.

The crickets' tinkling chips of sound
Strewed all the twilight-twinkling ground;
A whip-poor-will began to cry,
And, staggering through the sober sky,
A bat went on its drunken round,
Its shadow following on the ground.

Then from a bush, an elder-copse,
That spiced the dark with musky tops,
What seemed, at first, a shadow came
And took her hand and called her name,
And kissed her where, in starry drops,
The dew orbed on the elder-tops.

The glaucous glow of fireflies
Flickered the dusk; and fox-like eyes
Peered from the sha...

Tune - "My love is lost to me."


I.

    O, were I on Parnassus' hill!
    Or had of Helicon my fill;
    That I might catch poetic skill,
        To sing how dear I love thee.
    But Nith maun be my Muse's well;
    My Muse maun be thy bonnie sel':
    On Corsincon I'll glow'r and spell,
        And write how dear I love thee.

II.

    Then come, sweet Muse, inspire my lay!
    For a' the lee-lang simmer's day
    I coudna sing, I coudna say,
        How much, how dear, I love thee.
    I see thee dancing o'er the green,
    Thy waist sae jimp, thy limbs sae clean,
    Thy tempting lips, thy roguish een,
        By heaven and earth I love thee!

III.

    By night, by day, a-field, at hame,

O! how much more doth beauty beauteous seem
By that sweet ornament which truth doth give.
The rose looks fair, but fairer we it deem
For that sweet odour, which doth in it live.
The canker blooms have full as deep a dye
As the perfumed tincture of the roses.
Hang on such thorns, and play as wantonly
When summer’s breath their masked buds discloses:
But, for their virtue only is their show,
They live unwoo’d, and unrespected fade;
Die to themselves. Sweet roses do not so;
Of their sweet deaths, are sweetest odours made:
And so of you, beauteous and lovely youth,
When that shall vade, by verse distills your truth.

The small wind whispers through the leafless hedge
Most sharp and chill, where the light snowy flakes
Rest on each twig and spike of wither'd sedge,
Resembling scatter'd feathers;--vainly breaks
The pale split sunbeam through the frowning cloud,
On Winter's frowns below--from day to day
Unmelted still he spreads his hoary shroud,
In dithering pride on the pale traveller's way,
Who, croodling, hastens from the storm behind
Fast gathering deep and black, again to find
His cottage-fire and corner's sheltering bounds;
Where, haply, such uncomfortable days
Make musical the wood-sap's frizzling sounds,
And hoarse loud bellows puffing up the blaze.

"Secretum meum mihi"
(FADED WOMAN'S SONG)



There was a spell of leisure,
No record vouches when;
With honours, praises, pleasure
To womankind from men.

But no such lures bewitched me,
No hand was stretched to raise,
No gracious gifts enriched me,
No voices sang my praise.

Yet an iris at that season
Amid the accustomed slight
From denseness, dull unreason,
Ringed me with living light.

Somebody said, in the crowd, last eve,
    That you were married, or soon to be.
I have not thought of you, I believe,
    Since last we parted.    Let me see:
Five long Summers have passed since then -
    Each has been pleasant in its own way -
And you are but one of a dozen men
    Who have played the suitor a Summer day.

But, nevertheless, when I heard your name,
    Coupled with some one's, not my own,
There burned in my bosom a sudden flame,
    That carried me back to the day that is flown.
I was sitting again by the laughing brook,
    With you at my feet, and the sky above,
And my heart was fluttering under your look -
    The unmistakable look of Love.

Again your breath, like a South wind, fanned
    My cheek, where the blushes came ...

[John P. Altgeld.Born Dec. 30, 1847; died March 12, 1902]


    Sleep softly * * * eagle forgotten * * * under the stone.
    Time has its way with you there, and the clay has its own.

    "We have buried him now," thought your foes, and in secret rejoiced.
    They made a brave show of their mourning, their hatred unvoiced.
    They had snarled at you, barked at you, foamed at you day after day,
    Now you were ended.    They praised you, * * * and laid you away.

    The others that mourned you in silence and terror and truth,
    The widow bereft of her crust, and the boy without youth,
    The mocked and the scorned and the wounded, the lame and the poor
    That should have remembered forever, * * * remember no more.

    Where are those lovers of yours...

I stood with the Dead, so forsaken and still:
When dawn was grey I stood with the Dead.
And my slow heart said, "You must kill; you must kill:
Soldier, soldier, morning is red."

On the shapes of the slain in their crumpled disgrace
I stared for a while through the thin cold rain....
"O lad that I loved, there is rain on your face,
And your eyes are blurred and sick like the plain."

I stood with the Dead.... They were dead; they were dead;
My heart and my head beat a march of dismay;
And gusts of the wind came dulled by the guns....
"Fall in!" I shouted; "Fall in for your pay!"

Many a day and night my bark stood ready laden;
Waiting fav'ring winds, I sat with true friends round me,
Pledging me to patience and to courage,
In the haven.

And they spoke thus with impatience twofold:
"Gladly pray we for thy rapid passage,
Gladly for thy happy voyage; fortune
In the distant world is waiting for thee,
In our arms thoult find thy prize, and love too,
When returning."

And when morning came, arose an uproar,
And the sailors' joyous shouts awoke us;
All was stirring, all was living, moving,
Bent on sailing with the first kind zephyr.

And the sails soon in the breeze are swelling,
And the sun with fiery love invites us;
Fill'd the sails are, clouds on high are floating,
On the shore each friend exulting raises
Songs o...