Collected Poems Read online

  And, ah, blackened by strange blight,

  Or to a false sun unfurled,

  Now forevermore goodbye,

  All the gardens in the world!

  On the windless hills of Heaven,

  That I have no wish to see,

  White, eternal lilies stand,

  By a lake of ebony.

  But the Earth forevermore

  Is a place where nothing grows,—

  Dawn will come, and no bud break;

  Evening, and no blossom close.

  Spring will come, and wander slow

  Over an indifferent land,

  Stand beside an empty creek,

  Hold a dead seed in her hand.”

  ————

  God had called us, and we came,

  But the blessèd road I trod

  Was a bitter road to me,

  And at heart I questioned God.

  “Though in Heaven,” I said, “be all

  That the heart would most desire,

  Held Earth naught save souls of sinners

  Worth the saving from a fire?

  Withered grass,—the wasted growing!

  Aimless ache of laden boughs!”

  Little things God had forgotten

  Called me, from my burning house.

  “Though in Heaven,” I said, “be all

  That the eye could ask to see,

  All the things I ever knew

  Are this blaze in back of me.”

  “Though in Heaven,” I said, “be all

  That the ear could think to lack,

  All the things I ever knew

  Are this roaring at my back.”

  ————

  It was God who walked ahead,

  Like a shepherd to the fold;

  In his footsteps fared the weak,

  And the weary and the old,

  Glad enough of gladness over,

  Ready for the peace to be,—

  But a thing God had forgotten

  Was the growing bones of me.

  And I drew a bit apart,

  And I lagged a bit behind,

  And I thought on Peace Eternal,

  Lest He look into my mind:

  And I gazed upon the sky,

  And I thought of Heavenly Rest,—

  And I slipped away like water

  Through the fingers of the blest!

  All their eyes were fixed on Glory,

  Not a glance brushed over me;

  “Alleluia! Alleluia!”

  Up the road,—and I was free.

  And my heart rose like a freshet,

  And it swept me on before,

  Giddy as a whirling stick,

  Till I felt the earth once more.

  ————

  All the Earth was charred and black,

  Fire had swept from pole to pole;

  And the bottom of the sea

  Was as brittle as a bowl;

  And the timbered mountain-top

  Was as naked as a skull,

  Nothing left, nothing left,

  Of the Earth so beautiful!

  “Earth,” I said, “how can I leave you?”

  “You are all I have,” I said;

  “What is left to take my mind up,

  Living always, and you dead?”

  “Speak!” I said, “Oh, tell me something!

  Make a sign that I can see!

  For a keepsake! To keep always!

  Quick!—before God misses me!”

  And I listened for a voice;—

  But my heart was all I heard;

  Not a screech-owl, not a loon,

  Not a tree-toad said a word.

  And I waited for a sign;—

  Coals and cinders, nothing more;

  And a little cloud of smoke

  Floating on a valley floor.

  And I peered into the smoke

  Till it rotted, like a fog:—

  There, encompassed round by fire,

  Stood a blue-flag in a bog!

  Little flames came wading out,

  Straining, straining towards its stem,

  But it was so blue and tall

  That it scorned to think of them!

  Red and thirsty were their tongues,

  As the tongues of wolves must be,

  But it was so blue and tall—

  Oh, I laughed, I cried, to see!

  All my heart became a tear,

  All my soul became a tower,

  Never loved I anything

  As I loved that tall blue flower!

  It was all the little boats

  That had ever sailed the sea,

  It was all the little books

  That had gone to school with me;

  On its roots like iron claws

  Rearing up so blue and tall,—

  It was all the gallant Earth

  With its back against a wall!

  In a breath, ere I had breathed,—

  Oh, I laughed, I cried, to see!—

  I was kneeling at its side,

  And it leaned its head on me!

  ————

  Crumbling stones and sliding sand

  Is the road to Heaven now;

  Icy at my straining knees

  Drags the awful under-tow;

  Soon but stepping-stones of dust

  Will the road to Heaven be,—

  Father, Son and Holy Ghost,

  Reach a hand and rescue me!

  “There—there, my blue-flag flower;

  Hush—hush—go to sleep;

  That is only God you hear,

  Counting up His folded sheep!

  Lullabye—lullabye—

  That is only God that calls,

  Missing me, seeking me,

  Ere the road to nothing falls!

  He will set His mighty feet

  Firmly on the sliding sand;

  Like a little frightened bird

  I will creep into His hand;

  I will tell Him all my grief,

  I will tell Him all my sin;

  He will give me half His robe

  For a cloak to wrap you in.

  Lullabye—lullabye—”

  Rocks the burnt-out planet free!—

  Father, Son and Holy Ghost,

  Reacha hand and rescue me!

  ————

  Ah, the voice of love at last!

  Lo, at last the face of light!

  And the whole of His white robe

  For a cloak against the night!

  And upon my heart asleep

  All the things I ever knew!—

  “Holds Heaven not some cranny, Lord,

  For a flower so tall and blue?”

  All’s well and all’s well!

  Gay the lights of Heaven show!

  In some moist and Heavenly place

  We will set it out to grow.

  Journey

  Ah, could I lay me down in this long grass

  And close my eyes, and let the quiet wind

  Blow over me— I am so tired, so tired

  Of passing pleasant places! All my life,

  Following Care along the dusty road,

  Have I looked back at loveliness and sighed;

  Yet at my hand an unrelenting hand

  Tugged ever, and I passed. All my life long

  Over my shoulder have I looked at peace;

  And now I fain would lie in this long grass

  And close my eyes.

  Yet onward!

  Cat-birds call

  Through the long afternoon, and creeks at dusk

  Are guttural. Whip-poor-wills wake and cry,

  Drawing the twilight close about their throats.

  Only my heart makes answer. Eager vines

  Go up the rocks and wait; flushed apple-trees

  Pause in their dance and break the ring for me;

  Dim, shady wood-roads, redolent of fern

  And bayberry, that through sweet bevies thread

  Of round
-faced roses, pink and petulant,

  Look back and beckon ere they disappear.

  Only my heart, only my heart responds.

  Yet, ah, my path is sweet on either side

  All through the dragging day,—sharp underfoot

  And hot, and like dead mist the dry dust hangs—

  But far, oh, far as passionate eye can reach,

  And long, ah, long as rapturous eye can cling,

  The world is mine: blue hill, still silver lake,

  Broad field, bright flower, and the long white road;

  A gateless garden, and an open path;

  My feet to follow, and my heart to hold.

  Eel-Grass

  No matter what I say,

  All that I really love

  Is the rain that flattens on the bay,

  And the eel-grass in the cove;

  The jingle-shells that lie and bleach

  At the tide-line, and the trace

  Of higher tides along the beach:

  Nothing in this place.

  Elegy Before Death

  There will be rose and rhododendron

  When you are dead and under ground;

  Still will be heard from white syringas

  Heavy with bees, a sunny sound;

  Still will the tamaracks be raining

  After the rain has ceased, and still

  Will there be robins in the stubble,

  Grey sheep upon the warm green hill.

  Spring will not ail nor autumn falter;

  Nothing will know that you are gone,—

  Saving alone some sullen plough-land

  None but yourself sets foot upon;

  Saving the may-weed and the pig-weed

  Nothing will know that you are dead,—

  These, and perhaps a useless wagon

  Standing beside some tumbled shed.

  Oh, there will pass with your great passing

  Little of beauty not your own,—

  Only the light from common water,

  Only the grace from simple stone!

  The Bean-Stalk

  Ho, Giant! This is I!

  I have built me a bean-stalk into your

  La,—but it’s lovely, up so high!

  This is how I came,—I Put

  Here my knee, there my foot,

  Up and up, from shoot to shoot—

  And the blessèd bean-stalk thinning

  Like the mischief all the time,

  Till it took me rocking, spinning,

  In a dizzy, sunny circle,

  Making angles with the root,

  Far and out above the cackle

  Of the city I was born in,

  Till the little dirty city

  In the light so sheer and sunny

  Shone as dazzling bright and pretty

  As the money that you find

  In a dream of finding money—

  What a wind! What a morning!—

  Till the tiny, shiny city,

  When I shot a glance below,

  Shaken with a giddy laughter,

  Sick and blissfully afraid,

  Was a dew-drop on a blade,

  And a pair of moments after

  Was the whirling guess I made,—

  And the wind was like a whip

  Cracking past my icy ears,

  And my hair stood out behind,

  And my eyes were full of tears,

  Wide-open and cold,

  More tears than they could hold,

  The wind was blowing so,

  And my teeth were in a row,

  Dry and grinning,

  And I felt my foot slip,

  And I scratched the wind and whined,

  And I clutched the stalk and jabbered,

  With my eyes shut blind,—

  What a wind! What a wind!

  Your broad sky, Giant,

  Is the shelf of a cupboard;

  I make bean-stalks, I’m

  A builder, like yourself,

  But bean-stalks is my trade,

  I couldn’t make a shelf,

  Don’t know how they’re made,

  Now, a bean-stalk is more pliant—

  La, what a climb!

  Weeds

  White with daisies and red with sorrel

  And empty, empty under the sky!—

  Life is a quest and love a quarrel—

  Here is a place for me to lie.

  Daisies spring from damned seeds,

  And this red fire that here I see

  Is a worthless crop of crimson weeds,

  Cursed by farmers thriftily.

  But here, unhated for an hour,

  The sorrel runs in ragged flame,

  The daisy stands, a bastard flower,

  Like flowers that bear an honest name.

  And here a while, where no wind brings

  The baying of a pack athirst,

  May sleep the sleep of blessèd things,

  The blood too bright, the brow accurst.

  Passer Mortuus Est

  Death devours all lovely things:

  Lesbia with her sparrow

  Shares the darkness,—presently

  Every bed is narrow.

  Unremembered as old rain

  Dries the sheer libation;

  And the little petulant hand

  Is an annotation.

  After all, my erstwhile dear,

  My no longer cherished,

  Need we say it was not love,

  Just because it perished?

  Pastoral

  If it were only still!—

  With far away the shrill

  Crying of a cock;

  Or the shaken bell

  From a cow’s throat

  Moving through the bushes;

  Or the soft shock

  Of wizened apples falling

  From an old tree

  In a forgotten orchard

  Upon the hilly rock!

  Oh, grey hill,

  Where the grazing herd

  Licks the purple blossom,

  Crops the spiky weed!

  Oh, stony pasture,

  Where the tall mullein

  Stands up so sturdy

  On its little seed!

  Assault

  I Had forgotten how the frogs must sound

  After a year of silence, else I think

  I should not so have ventured forth alone

  At dusk upon this unfrequented road.

  I am waylaid by Beauty. Who will walk

  Between me and the crying of the frogs?

  Oh, savage Beauty, suffer me to pass,

  That am a timid woman, on her way

  From one house to another!

  Travel

  The railroad track is miles away,

  And the day is loud with voices speaking,

  Yet there isn’t a train goes by all day

  But I hear its whistle shrieking.

  All night there isn’t a train goes by,

  Though the night is still for sleep and dreaming,

  But I see its cinders red on the sky,

  And hear its engine steaming.

  My heart is warm with the friends I make,

  And better friends I’ll not be knowing;

  Yet there isn’t a train I wouldn’t take,

  No matter where it’s going.

  Low-Tide

  These wet rocks where the tide has been,

  Barnacled white and weeded brown

  And slimed beneath to a beautiful green,

  These wet rocks where the tide went down

  Will show again when the tide is high

  Faint and perilous, far from shore,

  No place to dream, but a place to die:

  The bottom of the sea once more.

  There was a child that wandered through

  A giant’s empty house all day,—

  House full of wonderful things and new,

  But no fit place for a child to play!

  Song of a Second April


  April this year, not otherwise

  Than April of a year ago,

  Is full of whispers, full of sighs,

  Of dazzling mud and dingy snow;

  Hepaticas that pleased you so

  Are here again, and butterflies.

  There rings a hammering all day,

  And shingles lie about the doors;

  In orchards near and far away

  The grey wood-pecker taps and bores;

  And men are merry at their chores,

  And children earnest at their play.

  The larger streams run still and deep,

  Noisy and swift the small brooks run;

  Among the mullein stalks the sheep

  Go up the hillside in the sun,

  Pensively,—only you are gone,

  You that alone I cared to keep.

  Rosemary

  For the sake of some things

  That be now no more

  I will strew rushes

  On my chamber-floor,

  I will plant bergamot

  At my kitchen-door.

  For the sake of dim things

  That were once so plain

  I will set a barrel

  Out to catch the rain,

  I will hang an iron po t

  On an iron crane.

  Many things be dead and gone

  That were brave and gay;

  For the sake of these things

  I will learn to say,

  “An it please you, gentle sirs,”

  “Alack!” and “Well-a-day!”

  The Poet and His Book

  Down, you mongrel,Death!

  Back into your kennel!

  I have stolen breath

  In a stalk of fennel!

  You shall scratch and you shall whine

  Many a night, and you shall worry

  Many a bone, before you bury

  One sweet bone of mine!

  When shall I be dead?

  When my flesh is withered,

  And above my head

  Yellow pollen gathered

  All the empty afternoon?

  When sweet lovers pause and wonder

  Who am I that lie thereunder,

  Hidden from the moon?

  This my personal death?—

  That my lungs be failing

  To inhale the breath

  Others are exhaling?

  This my subtle spirit’s end?—

  Ah, when the thawed winter splashes

  Over these chance dust and ashes,

  Weep not me, my friend!

  Me, by no means dead

  In that hour, but surely

  When this book, unread,

  Rots to earth obscurely,

  And no more to any breast,

  Close against the clamorous swelling

  Of the thing there is no telling,

  Are these pages pressed!

  When this book is mould,