Death

Have I dreamed? or was it real,
    What I saw as in a vision,
When to marches hymeneal
In the land of the Ideal
    Moved my thought o'er Fields Elysian?

What! are these the guests whose glances
    Seemed like sunshine gleaming round me?
These the wild, bewildering fancies,
That with dithyrambic dances
    As with magic circles bound me?

Ah! how cold are their caresses!
    Pallid cheeks, and haggard bosoms!
Spectral gleam their snow-white dresses,
And from loose dishevelled tresses
    Fall the hyacinthine blossoms!

O my songs! whose winsome measures
    Filled my heart with secret rapture!
Children of my golden leisures!
Must even your delights and pleasures
    Fade and perish with the capture?

Fair they seemed,...

All wantonly in hours of joy,
I made a song of pain.
Soon Grief drew near, and paused to hear,
And sang the sad refrain,
Again and yet again.

Then recklessly in my despair,
I sang of hope one day.
And Joy turned back upon life's track,
And smiled, and came my way,
And sat her down to stay.

I

There are beggars in Iran and Araby,
SAID was hungrier than all;
Hafiz said he was a fly
That came to every festival.
He came a pilgrim to the Mosque
On trail of camel and caravan,
Knew every temple and kiosk
Out from Mecca to Ispahan;
Northward he went to the snowy hills,
At court he sat in the grave Divan.
His music was the south-wind's sigh,
His lamp, the maiden's downcast eye,
And ever the spell of beauty came
And turned the drowsy world to flame.
By lake and stream and gleaming hall
And modest copse and the forest tall,
Where'er he went, the magic guide
Kept its place by the poet's side.
Said melted the days like cups of pearl,
Served high and low, the lord and the churl,
Loved harebells nodding on a rock,
A cabin hun...

        I wonder can this be the world it was
        At sunset? I remember the sky fell
        Green as pale meadows, at the long street-ends,
        But overhead the smoke-wrack hugged the roofs
        As if to shut the city from God's eyes
        Till dawn should quench the laughter and the lights.
        Beneath the gas flare stolid faces passed,
        Too dull for sin; old loosened lips set hard
        To drain the stale lees from the cup of sense;
        Or if a young face yearned from out the mist
        Made by its own bright hair, the eyes were wan
        With desolate fore-knowledge of the end.
        My life lay waste about me: as I walked,
        From the gross dark of unfrequented streets
        The face of my own youth peered forth at me,

See, I have climbed the mountain side
Up to this holy house of God,
Where once that Angel-Painter trod
Who saw the heavens opened wide,

And throned upon the crescent moon
The Virginal white Queen of Grace,
Mary! could I but see thy face
Death could not come at all too soon.

O crowned by God with thorns and pain!
Mother of Christ! O mystic wife!
My heart is weary of this life
And over-sad to sing again.

O crowned by God with love and flame!
O crowned by Christ the Holy One!
O listen ere the searching sun
Show to the world my sin and shame.

Destined to war from very infancy
Was I, Roberto Dati, and I took
In Malta the white symbol of the Cross:
Nor in life's vigorous season did I shun
Hazard or toil; among the sands was seen
Of Libya; and not seldom, on the banks
Of wide Hungarian Danube, 'twas my lot
To hear the sanguinary trumpet sounded.
So lived I, and repined not at such fate:
This only grieves me, for it seems a wrong,
That stripped of arms I to my end am brought
On the soft down of my paternal home.
Yet haply Arno shall be spared all cause
To blush for me. Thou, loiter not nor halt
In thy appointed way, and bear in mind
How fleeting and how frail is human life!

Yes! yes! I dare say it is so,
And you should be pitied, but how could I know,
Watching alone by the moon-lit bay;
But that is past for many a day,
For the woman that loved, died years ago,
    Years ago.

She had loving eyes, with a wistful look
In their depths that day, and I know you took
Her face in your hands and read it o'er,
As if you should never see it more;
You were right, for she died long years ago,
    Years ago.

Had I trusted you - for trust, you know
Will keep love's fire forever aglow;
Then what would have mattered storm or sun,
But the watching - the waiting, all is done;
For the woman that loved, died years ago,
    Years ago.

Yes; I think you are constant, true and good,
I am tired, and would love you if I cou...

I

That one long dirge-moan sad and deep,
Low, muffled by the solemn stress
Of such emotion as doth steep
The soul in brooding quietness,
Befits our anguished time too well,
Whose Life-march is a funeral knell.

Dirge for a mighty Creed outworn
Its spirit fading from the earth,
Its mouldering body left forlorn:
Weak idol! feeding scornful mirth
In shallow hearts; divine no more
Save to some ignorant pagan poor;

And some who know how by Its light
The past world well did walk and live,
And feel It even now more bright
Than any lamp mere men can give;
So cling to It with yearning faith,
Yet own It almost quenched in death:

While many who win wealth and power
And honours serving at Its shrine,
Rather than lose their w...

This is our lot if we live so long and labour unto the end,
Then we outlive the impatient years and the much too patient friend:
And because we know we have breath in our mouth and think we have thoughts enough in our head,
We shall assume that we are alive, whereas we are really dead.

We shall not acknowledge that old stars fade or stronger planets arise
(That the sere bush buds or the desert blooms or the ancient well-head dries),
Or any new compass wherewith new men adventure ‘neath new skies.

We shall lift up the ropes that constrained our youth, to bind on our children’s hands;
We shall call to the waters below the bridges to return and to replenish our lands;
We shall harness (Death’s own pale horses) and scholarly plough the sands.

We shall lie down in the eye of t...

Through shattered galleries, 'mid roofless halls,
Wandering with timid footsteps oft betrayed,
The Stranger sighs, nor scruples to upbraid
Old Time, though he, gentlest among the Thralls
Of Destiny, upon these wounds hath laid
His lenient touches, soft as light that falls,
From the wan Moon, upon the towers and walls,
Light deepening the profoundest sleep of shade.
Relic of Kings! Wreck of forgotten wars,
To winds abandoned and the prying stars,
Time 'loves' Thee! at his call the Seasons twine
Luxuriant wreaths around thy forehead hoar;
And, though past pomp no changes can restore,
A soothing recompense, his gift, is thine!

The Text is taken from Buchan's Ballads of the North of Scotland. It consists largely of familiar fragments. Stanzas 9-11 can be found in The Grey Cock.


The Story is a trivial piece in Buchan's usual style; but the smiling ghost, which is female (17.1), is a delightful novelty. She assumes the position of guardian of Willie's morals, then tears him in pieces, and hangs a piece on every seat in the church, and his head over Meggie's pew!


WILLIE'S FATAL VISIT

    1.
    'Twas on an evening fair I went to take the air,
        I heard a maid making her moan;
    Said, 'Saw ye my father? Or saw ye my mother?
        Or saw ye my brother John?
    Or saw ye the lad that I love best,
        And his name it is Sweet William?'

    2.
    'I s...

It stands alone on a haunted shore,
With curious words of deathless lore
On its massive gate impearled;
And its carefully guarded mystic key
Locks in its silent mystery
From the seeking eyes of the world.

Oft do its stately walls repeat
Echoes of music wildly sweet
Swelling to gladness high -
With mournful ballads of ancient time,
And funeral hymns - and a nursery rhyme
Dying away in a sigh.

Pictures out of each haunted room,
Up through the ghostly shadows loom,
And gleam with a spectral light;
Pictures lit with a radiant glow,
And some that image such desolate woe
That, weeping, you turn from the sight.

Shining like stars in the twilight gloom
Brows as white as a lily's bloom
Gleam from its lattice and door;
And voic...

Ah, haughty hills, sardonic solitudes,
What wizard touch hath, crowning you with gold,
Cast Tyrian purple o'er broad-shouldered woods,
And to your pride anointed empire sold
For wan traditioned death, whose misty moods
Shake each huge throne of quarried shadows cold?

Now where the agate-foliaged forests sleep,
Bleak briars are ruby-berried, and the brush
Flames - when the winds armsful of motion heap
In wincing gusts upon it - amber blush;
The beech an inner beryle breaks from deep
Encrusting topaz of a sullen flush.

Dead gold, dead bronze, dull amethystine rose,
Rose cameo, in day's gray, somber spar
Of smoky quartz - intaglioed beauty - glows
Luxuriance of color. Trunks that are
Vast organs antheming the winds' wild woes
A faded sun and pale...

Call me not back, O cold and crafty world:
I scorn your thankless thanks and hollow praise.
Wiser than seer or scientist content
To tread no paths beyond these bleating hills,
Here let me lie beneath this dear old elm,
Among the blossoms of the clover-fields,
And listen to the humming of the bees.
Here in those far-off, happy, boyhood years,
When all my world was bounded by these hills,
I dreamed my first dreams underneath this elm.
Dreamed? Aye, and builded castles in the clouds;
Dreamed, and made glad a fond, proud mother's heart,
Now moldering into clay on yonder hill;
Dreamed till my day-dreams paved the world with gold;
Dreamed till my mad dreams made one desolate;
Dreamed O my soul, and was it all a dream?

As I lay dreaming under this old elm,

EMMA AND EGINHARD

When Alcuin taught the sons of Charlemagne,
In the free schools of Aix, how kings should reign,
And with them taught the children of the poor
How subjects should be patient and endure,
He touched the lips of some, as best befit,
With honey from the hives of Holy Writ;
Others intoxicated with the wine
Of ancient history, sweet but less divine;
Some with the wholesome fruits of grammar fed;
Others with mysteries of the stars o'er-head,
That hang suspended in the vaulted sky
Like lamps in some fair palace vast and high.

In sooth, it was a pleasant sight to see
That Saxon monk, with hood and rosary,
With inkhorn at his belt, and pen and book,
And mingled lore and reverence in his look,
Or hear the cloister and the court repeat

A Middle-Aged Lyrical Poet Is Supposed To Be Taking Final Leave Of The Muse Of Comedy. She Has Brought Him His Hat And Gloves, And Is Abstractedly Picking A Thread Of Gold Hair From His Coat Sleeve As He Begins To Speak:

I say it under the rose--
oh, thanks!--yes, under the laurel,
We part lovers, not foes;
we are not going to quarrel.

We have too long been friends
on foot and in gilded coaches,
Now that the whole thing ends,
to spoil our kiss with reproaches.

I leave you; my soul is wrung;
I pause, look back from the portal--
Ah, I no more am young,
and you, child, you are immortal!

Mine is the glacier's way,
yours is the blossom's weather--
When were December and May
known to be happy together?

Before my kisses grow tame,

    Small, shapeless drifts of cloud
Sail slowly northward in the soft-hued sky,
    With blur half-tints and rolling summits bright,
By the late sun caressed; slight hazes shroud
    All things afar; shineth each leaf anigh
    With its own warmth and light.


    O'erblown by Southland airs,
The summer landscape basks in utter peace:
    In lazy streams the lazy clouds are seen;
Low hills, broad meadows, and large, clear-cut squares
    Of ripening corn-fields, rippled by the breeze,
    With shifting shade and sheen.


    Hark! and you may not hear
A sound less soothing than the rustle cool
    Of swaying leaves, the steady wiry drone
Of unseen crickets, sudden chirpings clear
    Of happy birds, the tinkle of the pool,
    Chafed ...

Dust on the page, from these forgetful years!
I brush it off, to see the fading date
Written in boyish hand; to find through tears
The lad's dear name, inscribed with all the state
Of the first day's possession; and to read
Along the tell-tale margin, scribbled thick.
Here is the note, 'twas writ with guilty speed
And here the sketch, with guilty pencil quick;
And here's a picture! Was she ever so?
Were these her curls and this her merry look
Who lieth in her old green grave as low
As he is lying? Ah, this faded book!
I think not of the bold and storied wrong
Done for a woman's fairness, nor of strong
And god-like heroes, nor of beauteous youth
In game and battle, but, with heart of ruth,
About this boy, who laughed and played and read
So carelessly! Ah, ...