The wind blew words along the skies, And these it blew to me Through the wide dusk: "Lift up your eyes, Behold this troubled tree, Complaining as it sways and plies; It is a limb of thee.
"Yea, too, the creatures sheltering round - Dumb figures, wild and tame, Yea, too, thy fellows who abound - Either of speech the same Or far and strange--black, dwarfed, and browned, They are stuff of thy own frame."
I moved on in a surging awe Of inarticulateness At the pathetic Me I saw In all his huge distress, Making self-slaughter of the law To kill, break, or suppress.
THE FADED FACE
How was this I did not see Such a look as here was shown Ere its womanhood had blown Past its first felicity? - That I did not know you young, Faded Face, Know you young!
Why did Time so ill bestead That I heard no voice of yours Hail from out the curved contours Of those lips when rosy red; Weeted not the songs they sung, Faded Face, Songs they sung!
By these blanchings, blooms of old, And the relics of your voice - Leavings rare of rich and choice From your early tone and mould - Let me mourn,--aye, sorrow-wrung, Faded Face, Sorrow-wrung!
THE RIDDLE
I
Stretching eyes west Over the sea, Wind foul or fair, Always stood she Prospect-impressed; Solely out there Did her gaze rest, Never elsewhere Seemed charm to be.
II
Always eyes east Ponders she now - As in devotion - Hills of blank brow Where no waves plough.
Never the least Room for emotion Drawn from the ocean Does she allow.
THE DUEL
"I am here to time, you see; The glade is well-screened--eh?--against alarm; Fit place to vindicate by my arm The honour of my spotless wife, Who scorns your libel upon her life In boasting intimacy!
""All hush-offerings you"ll spurn, My husband. Two must come; one only go,"
She said. "That he"ll be you I know; To faith like ours Heaven will be just, And I shall abide in fullest trust Your speedy glad return.""
"Good. Here am also I; And we"ll proceed without more waste of words To warm your c.o.c.kpit. Of the swords Take you your choice. I shall thereby Feel that on me no blame can lie, Whatever Fate accords."
So stripped they there, and fought, And the swords clicked and sc.r.a.ped, and the onsets sped; Till the husband fell; and his shirt was red With streams from his heart"s hot cistern. Nought Could save him now; and the other, wrought Maybe to pity, said:
"Why did you urge on this?
Your wife a.s.sured you; and "t had better been That you had let things pa.s.s, serene In confidence of long-tried bliss, Holding there could be nought amiss In what my words might mean."
Then, seeing nor ruth nor rage Could move his foeman more--now Death"s deaf thrall - He wiped his steel, and, with a call Like turtledove to dove, swift broke Into the copse, where under an oak His horse cropt, held by a page.
"All"s over, Sweet," he cried To the wife, thus guised; for the young page was she.
""Tis as we hoped and said "t would be.
He never guessed . . . We mount and ride To where our love can reign uneyed.
He"s clay, and we are free."
AT MAYFAIR LODGINGS
How could I be aware, The opposite window eyeing As I lay listless there, That through its blinds was dying One I had rated rare Before I had set me sighing For another more fair?
Had the house-front been gla.s.s, My vision un.o.bscuring, Could aught have come to pa.s.s More happiness-insuring To her, loved as a la.s.s When spouseless, all-alluring?
I reckon not, alas!
So, the square window stood, Steadily night-long shining In my close neighbourhood, Who looked forth undivining That soon would go for good One there in pain reclining, Unpardoned, unadieu"d.
Silently screened from view Her tragedy was ending That need not have come due Had she been less unbending.
How near, near were we two At that last vital rending, - And neither of us knew!
TO MY FATHER"S VIOLIN
Does he want you down there In the Nether Glooms where The hours may be a dragging load upon him, As he hears the axle grind Round and round Of the great world, in the blind Still profound Of the night-time? He might liven at the sound Of your string, revealing you had not forgone him.
In the gallery west the nave, But a few yards from his grave, Did you, tucked beneath his chin, to his bowing Guide the homely harmony Of the quire Who for long years strenuously - Son and sire - Caught the strains that at his fingering low or higher From your four thin threads and eff-holes came outflowing.
And, too, what merry tunes He would bow at nights or noons That chanced to find him bent to lute a measure, When he made you speak his heart As in dream, Without book or music-chart, On some theme Elusive as a jack-o"-lanthorn"s gleam, And the psalm of duty shelved for trill of pleasure.
Well, you can not, alas, The barrier overpa.s.s That screens him in those Mournful Meads hereunder, Where no fiddling can be heard In the glades Of silentness, no bird Thrills the shades; Where no viol is touched for songs or serenades, No bowing wakes a congregation"s wonder.
He must do without you now, Stir you no more anyhow To yearning concords taught you in your glory; While, your strings a tangled wreck, Once smart drawn, Ten worm-wounds in your neck, Purflings wan With dust-h.o.a.r, here alone I sadly con Your present dumbness, shape your olden story.
1916.
THE STATUE OF LIBERTY
This statue of Liberty, busy man, Here erect in the city square, I have watched while your scrubbings, this early morning, Strangely wistful, And half tristful, Have turned her from foul to fair;