Even the shrewd and bitter, Gnarled by the old world"s greed, Cherished the stranger softly Seeing his utter need.
Shelter and patient hearing, These were their gifts to him, To the minstrel, grimly begging As the sunset-fire grew dim.
The rich said "You are welcome."
Yea, even the rich were good.
How strange that in their feasting His songs were understood!
The doors of the poor were open, The poor who had wandered too, Who had slept with ne"er a roof-tree Under the wind and dew.
The minds of the poor were open, Their dark mistrust was dead.
They loved his wizard stories, They bought his rhymes with bread.
Those were his days of glory, Of faith in his fellow-men.
Therefore, to-day the singer Turns beggar once again.
The Angel and the Clown
I saw wild domes and bowers And smoking incense towers And mad exotic flowers In Illinois.
Where ragged ditches ran Now springs of Heaven began Celestial drink for man In Illinois.
There stood beside the town Beneath its incense-crown An angel and a clown In Illinois.
He was as Clowns are: She was snow and star With eyes that looked afar In Illinois.
I asked, "How came this place Of antique Asian grace Amid our callow race In Illinois?"
Said Clown and Angel fair: "By laughter and by prayer, By casting off all care In Illinois."
Springfield Magical
In this, the City of my Discontent, Sometimes there comes a whisper from the gra.s.s, "Romance, Romance--is here. No Hindu town Is quite so strange. No Citadel of Bra.s.s By Sinbad found, held half such love and hate; No picture-palace in a picture-book Such webs of Friendship, Beauty, Greed and Fate!"
In this, the City of my Discontent, Down from the sky, up from the smoking deep Wild legends new and old burn round my bed While trees and gra.s.s and men are wrapped in sleep.
Angels come down, with Christmas in their hearts, Gentle, whimsical, laughing, heaven-sent; And, for a day, fair Peace have given me In this, the City of my Discontent!
Incense
Think not that incense-smoke has had its day.
My friends, the incense-time has but begun.
Creed upon creed, cult upon cult shall bloom, Shrine after shrine grow gray beneath the sun.
And mountain-boulders in our aged West Shall guard the graves of hermits truth-endowed: And there the scholar from the Chinese hills Shall do deep honor, with his wise head bowed.
And on our old, old plains some muddy stream, Dark as the Ganges, shall, like that strange tide-- (Whispering mystery to half the earth)-- Gather the praying millions to its side,
And flow past halls with statues in white stone To saints unborn to-day, whose lives of grace Shall make one shining, universal church Where all Faiths kneel, as brothers, in one place.
The Wedding of the Rose and the Lotos
The wide Pacific waters And the Atlantic meet.
With cries of joy they mingle, In tides of love they greet.
Above the drowned ages A wind of wooing blows:-- The red rose woos the lotos, The lotos woos the rose . . .
The lotos conquered Egypt.
The rose was loved in Rome.
Great India crowned the lotos: (Britain the rose"s home).
Old China crowned the lotos, They crowned it in j.a.pan.
But Christendom adored the rose Ere Christendom began . . .
The lotos speaks of slumber: The rose is as a dart.
The lotos is Nirvana: The rose is Mary"s heart.
The rose is deathless, restless, The splendor of our pain: The flush and fire of labor That builds, not all in vain. . . .
The genius of the lotos Shall heal earth"s too-much fret.
The rose, in blinding glory, Shall waken Asia yet.
Hail to their loves, ye peoples!
Behold, a world-wind blows, That aids the ivory lotos To wed the red red rose!
King Arthur"s Men Have Come Again
[Written while a field-worker in the Anti-Saloon League of Illinois.]
King Arthur"s men have come again.
They challenge everywhere The foes of Christ"s Eternal Church.
Her incense crowns the air.
The heathen knighthood cower and curse To hear the bugles ring, BUT SPEARS ARE SET, THE CHARGE IS ON, WISE ARTHUR SHALL BE KING!
And Cromwell"s men have come again, I meet them in the street.
Stern but in this--no way of thorns Shall snare the children"s feet.
The reveling foemen wreak but waste, A sodden poisonous band.
FIERCE CROMWELL BUILDS THE FLOWER-BRIGHT TOWNS, AND A MORE SUNLIT LAND!
And Lincoln"s men have come again.
Up from the South he flayed, The grandsons of his foes arise In his own cause arrayed.