Freedom

Good morning good morning a happy new year!
We greet you, kind friends of the old Pioneer;
Hope your coffee is good and your steak is well done,
And you're happy as clams in the sand and the sun.
The old year's a shadow a shade of the past;
It is gone with its toils and its triumphs so vast
With its joys and its tears with its pleasure and pain
With its shouts of the brave and its heaps of the slain
Gone and it cometh no, never again.
And as we look forth on the future so fair
Let us brush from the picture the visage of care;
The error, the folly, the frown and the tear
Drop them all at the grave of the silent old year.
Has the heart been oppressed with a burden of woe?
Has the spirit been cowed by a merciless blow?
Has the tongue of the brave or the voice o...

The Hired Man's supper, which he sat before,
In near reach of the wood-box, the stove-door
And one leaf of the kitchen-table, was
Somewhat belated, and in lifted pause
His dextrous knife was balancing a bit
Of fried mush near the port awaiting it.

At the glad children's advent - gladder still
To find him there - "Jest tickled fit to kill
To see ye all!" he said, with unctious cheer. -
"I'm tryin'-like to he'p Floretty here
To git things cleared away and give ye room
Accordin' to yer stren'th. But I p'sume
It's a pore boarder, as the poet says,
That quarrels with his victuals, so I guess
I'll take another wedge o' that-air cake,
Florett', that you're a-learnin' how to bake."
He winked and feigned to swallow painfully. -

"Jest 'for...

I

Victors, living, with laureled brow,
And you that sleep beneath the sward!
Your song was poured from cannon throats:
It rang in deep-tongued bugle-notes:
Your triumph came; you won your crown,
The grandeur of a world's renown.
        But, in our later lays,
        Full freighted with your praise,
Fair memory harbors those whose lives, laid down
    In gallant faith and generous heat,
        Gained only sharp defeat.
All are at peace, who once so fiercely warred:
Brother and brother, now, we chant a common chord.


II

    For, if we say God wills,
    Shall we then idly deny Him
    Care of each host in the fight?
    His thunder was here in the hills
    When the guns were loud in July;
    And the flash of the mu...

The pebbly brook is cold to-night,
Its water soft as air,
A clear, cold, crystal-bodied wind
Shadowless and bare,
Leaping and running in this world
Where dark-horned cattle stare:

Where dark-horned cattle stare, hoof-firm
On the dark pavements of the sky,
And trees are mummies swathed in sleep
And small dark hills crowd wearily;
Soft multitudes of snow-grey clouds
Without a sound march by.

Down at the bottom of the road
I smell the woody damp
Of that cold spirit in the grass,
And leave my hill-top camp -
Its long gun pointing in the sky -
And take the Moon for lamp.

I stop beside the bright cold glint
Of that thin spirit in the grass,
So gay it is, so innocent!
I watch its sparkling footsteps pass
Lightly from sm...

Love is enough.    Let us not ask for gold.
    Wealth breeds false aims, and pride, and selfishness;
In those serene, Arcadian days of old
    Men gave no thought to princely homes and dress.
The gods who dwelt on fair Olympia's height
Lived only for dear love and love's delight.
    Love is enough.

Love is enough.    Why should we care for fame?
    Ambition is a most unpleasant guest:
It lures us with the glory of a name
    Far from the happy haunts of peace and rest.
Let us stay here in this secluded place
Made beautiful by love's endearing grace!
    Love is enough.

Love is enough.    Why should we strive for power?
    It brings men only envy and distrust.
The poor world's homage pleases but an hour,
    And earthly honours vanish in th...

Bands of dark and bands of light
Lie athwart the homeward way;
Now we cross a belt of Night,
Now a strip of shining Day!

Now it is a month of June,
Now December's shivering hour;
Now rides high loved memories' Moon,
Now the Dark is dense with power!

Summers, winters, days, and nights,
Moons, and clouds, they come and go;
Joys and sorrows, pains, delights,
Hope and fear, and yes and no.

All is well: come, girls and boys,
Not a weary mile is vain!
Hark--dim laughter's radiant noise!
See the windows through the rain!

I.

Moonlight silvers the tops of trees,
Moonlight whitens the lilac shadowed wall
And through the evening fall,
Clearly, as if through enchanted seas,
Footsteps passing, an infinite distance away,
In another world and another day.
Moonlight turns the purple lilacs blue,
Moonlight leaves the fountain hoar and old,
And the boughs of elms grow green and cold,
Our footsteps echo on gleaming stones,
The leaves are stirred to a jargon of muted tones.
This is the night we have kept, you say:
This is the moonlit night that will never die.
Through the grey streets our memories retain
Let us go back again.

II.

Mist goes up from the river to dim the stars,
The river is black and cold; so let us dance
To flare of horns, and clang of cymbal...

I

IN CHURCH

Thou whose birth on earth
Angels sang to men,
While thy stars made mirth,
Saviour, at thy birth,
This day born again;

As this night was bright
With thy cradle-ray,
Very light of light,
Turn the wild world’s night
To thy perfect day.

God whose feet made sweet
Those wild ways they trod,
From thy fragrant feet
Staining field and street
With the blood of God;

God whose breast is rest
In the time of strife,
In thy secret breast
Sheltering souls opprest
From the heat of life;

God whose eyes are skies
Love-lit as with spheres
By the lights that rise
To thy watching eyes,
Orbed lights of tears;

God whose heart hath part
In all grief that is,
Was not m...

I.

Nature, so far as in her lies,
Imitates God, and turns her face
To every land beneath the skies,
Counts nothing that she meets with base,
But lives and loves in every place;



II.

Fills out the homely quickset-screens,
And makes the purple lilac ripe,
Steps from her airy hill, and greens
The swamp, where humm’d the dropping snipe,
With moss and braided marish-pipe;



III.

And on thy heart a finger lays,
Saying, ‘Beat quicker, for the time
Is pleasant, and the woods and ways
Are pleasant, and the beech and lime
Put forth and feel a gladder clime.’



IV.

And murmurs of a deeper voice,
Going before to some far shrine,
Teach that sick heart the stronger choice,

(TERCENTENARY, 1608-1908)

"Stops of various Quills."--LYCIDAS.


What need of votive Verse
To strew thy Laureat Herse
With that mix'd Flora of th' Aonian Hill?
Or Mincian vocall Reed,
That Cam and Isis breed,
When thine own Words are burning in us still?

Bard, Prophet, Archimage!
In this Cash-cradled Age,
We grate our scrannel Musick, and we dote:
Where is the Strain unknown,
Through Bronze or Silver blown,
That thrill'd the Welkin with thy woven Note?

Yes,--"we are selfish Men":
Yet would we once again
Might see Sabrina braid her amber Tire;

Or watch the Comus Crew
Sweep down the Glade; or view
Strange-streamer'd Craft from Javan or Gadire!

Or could we catch once more,
High up, the Clang and Roa...

Tranquility! the sovereign aim wert thou
In heathen schools of philosophic lore;
Heart-stricken by stern destiny of yore
The Tragic Muse thee served with thoughtful vow;
And what of hope Elysium could allow
Was fondly seized by Sculpture, to restore
Peace to the Mourner. But when He who wore
The crown of thorns around his bleeding brow
Warmed our sad being with celestial light,
'Then' Arts which still had drawn a softening grace
From shadowy fountains of the Infinite,
Communed with that Idea face to face:
And move around it now as planets run,
Each in its orbit round the central Sun.

Tune - "The winter of life."



I.

    But lately seen in gladsome green,
        The woods rejoiced the day;
    Thro' gentle showers and laughing flowers,
        In double pride were gay:
    But now our joys are fled
        On winter blasts awa!
    Yet maiden May, in rich array,
        Again shall bring them a'.


II.

    But my white pow, nae kindly thowe
        Shall melt the snaws of age;
    My trunk of eild, but buss or bield,
        Sinks in Time's wintry rage.
    Oh! age has weary days,
        And nights o' sleepless pain!
    Thou golden time o' youthfu' prime,
        Why comes thou not again?

The firmament breaks up. In black eclipse
Light after light goes out. One evil star,
Luridly glaring through the smoke of war,
As in the dream of the Apocalypse,
Drags others down. Let us not weakly weep
Nor rashly threaten. Give us grace to keep
Our faith and patience; wherefore should we leap
On one hand into fratricidal fight,
Or, on the other, yield eternal right,
Frame lies of law, and good and ill confound?
What fear we? Safe on freedom’s vantage-ground
Our feet are planted: let us there remain
In unrevengeful calm, no means untried
Which truth can sanction, no just claim denied,
The sad spectators of a suicide!
They break the links of Union: shall we light
The fires of hell to weld anew the chain
On that red anvil where each blow is pain?
Draw...

"Where art thou wandering, little child?"
I said to one I met to-day--
She push'd her bonnet up and smil'd,
"I'm going upon the green to play:
Folks tell me that the May's in flower,
That cowslip-peeps are fit to pull,
And I've got leave to spend an hour
To get this little basket full."

--And thou'st got leave to spend an hour !
My heart repeated--she was gone;
--And thou hast heard the thorn's in flower,
And childhood bliss is urging on:
Ah, happy child! thou mak'st me sigh,
This once as happy heart of mine,
Would nature with the boon comply,
How gladly would I change for thine.

I

Nurture thyself, O Soul, from the clear spring
That wells beneath the secret inner shrine;
Commune with its deep murmur, - 'tis divine;
Be faithful to the ebb and flow that bring
The outer tide of Spirit to trouble and swing
The inlet of thy being. Learn to know
These powers, and life with all its venom and show
Shall have no force to dazzle thee or sting:

And when Grief comes thou shalt have suffered more
Than all the deepest woes of all the world;
Joy, dancing in, shall find thee nourished with mirth;
Wisdom shall find her Master at thy door;
And Love shall find thee crowned with love empearled;
And death shall touch thee not but a new birth.


II

Be strong, O warring soul! For very sooth
Kings are but wraiths, republics fa...

What have I done for you,
England, my England?
What is there I would not do,
England my own?
With your glorious eyes austere,
As the Lord were walking near,
Whispering terrible things and dear
As the Song on your bugles blown,
    England,
Round the world on your bugles blown!

Where shall the watchful Sun,
England, my England,
Match the master-work you've done,
England my own?
When shall he rejoice agen
Such a breed of mighty men
As come forward, one to ten,
To the Song on your bugles blown,
    England,
Down the years on your bugles blown?

Ever the faith endures,
England, my England:
'Take and break us: we are yours,
'England, my own!
'Life is good, and joy runs high
'Between English earth and sky:

I know a land, I, too,
    Where warm keen incense on the sea-wind blows,
And all the winter long the skies are blue,
    And the brown deserts blossom with the rose.

Deserts of all delight,
    Cactus and palm and earth of thirsty gold,
Dark purple blooms round eaves of sun-washed white,
    And that Hesperian fruit men sought of old.

O, to be wandering there,
    Under the palm-trees, on that sunset shore,
Where the waves break in song, and the bright air
    Is crystal clean; and peace is ours, once more.

There Beauty dwells,
    Beauty, re-born in whiteness from the foam;
And Youth returns with all its magic spells,
    And the heart finds its long-forgotten home,--

Home--home! Where is that land?
    For, when I dream it found...

The world is full of orphans: firstly, those
        Who are so in the strict sense of the phrase
(But many a lonely tree the loftier grows
        Than others crowded in the forest's maze);
The next are such as are not doomed to lose
        Their tender parents in their budding days,
But merely their parental tenderness,
Which leaves them orphans of the heart no less.

The next are 'only children', as they are styled,
        Who grow up children only, since the old saw
Pronounces that an 'only' 's a spoilt child.
        But not to go too far, I hold it law
That where their education, harsh or mild,
        'Transgresses the great bounds of love or awe,
The sufferers, be't in heart or intellect,
Whate'er the cause are orphans in effect.

But to re...