The wind is singing through the trees to-night,A deep-voiced song of rushing cadencesAnd crashing intervals. No summer breezeIs this, though hot July is at its height,Gone is her gentler music; with delightShe listens to this booming like the seas,These elemental, loud necessitiesWhich call to her to answer their swift might.Above the tossing trees shines down a star,Quietly bright; this wild, tumultuous joyQuickens nor dims its splendour. And my mind,O Star! is filled with your white light, from far,So suffer me this one night to enjoyThe freedom of the onward sweeping wind.
The path runs straight between the flowering rows,A moonlit path, hemmed in by beds of bloom,Where phlox and marigolds dispute for roomWith tall, red dahlias and the briar rose.'T is reckless prodigality which throwsInto the night these wafts of rich perfumeWhich sweep across the garden like a plume.Over the trees a single bright star glows.Dear garden of my childhood, here my yearsHave run away like little grains of sand;The moments of my life, its hopes and fearsHave all found utterance here, where now I stand;My eyes ache with the weight of unshed tears,You are my home, do you not understand?
How is it that, being gone, you fill my days,And all the long nights are made glad by thee?No loneliness is this, nor misery,But great content that these should be the waysWhereby the Fancy, dreaming as she strays,Makes bright and present what she would would be.And who shall say if the realityIs not with dreams so pregnant. For delaysAnd hindrances may bar the wished-for end;A thousand misconceptions may preventOur souls from coming near enough to blend;Let me but think we have the same intent,That each one needs to call the other, "friend!"It may be vain illusion. I'm content.
I ask but one thing of you, only one,That always you will be my dream of you;That never shall I wake to find untrueAll this I have believed and rested on,Forever vanished, like a vision goneOut into the night. Alas, how fewThere are who strike in us a chord we knewExisted, but so seldom heard its toneWe tremble at the half-forgotten sound.The world is full of rude awakeningsAnd heaven-born castles shattered to the ground,Yet still our human longing vainly clingsTo a belief in beauty through all wrongs.O stay your hand, and leave my heart its songs!
What torture lurks within a single thoughtWhen grown too constant, and however kind,However welcome still, the weary mindAches with its presence. Dull remembrance taughtRemembers on unceasingly; unsoughtThe old delight is with us but to findThat all recurring joy is pain refined,Become a habit, and we struggle, caught.You lie upon my heart as on a nest,Folded in peace, for you can never knowHow crushed I am with having you at restHeavy upon my life. I love you soYou bind my freedom from its rightful quest.In mercy lift your drooping wings and go.
I do not care to talk to you althoughYour speech evokes a thousand sympathies,And all my being's silent harmoniesWake trembling into music. When you goIt is as if some sudden, dreadful blowHad severed all the strings with savage ease.No, do not talk; but let us rather seizeThis intimate gift of silence which we know.Others may guess your thoughts from what you say,As storms are guessed from clouds where darkness broods.To me the very essence of the dayReveals its inner purpose and its moods;As poplars feel the rain and then straightwayReverse their leaves and shimmer through the woods.
My heart is tuned to sorrow, and the stringsVibrate most readily to minor chords,Searching and sad; my mind is stuffed with wordsWhich voice the passion and the ache of things:Illusions beating with their baffled wingsAgainst the walls of circumstance, and hoardsOf torn desires, broken joys; recordsOf all a bruised life's maimed imaginings.Now you are come! You tremble like a starPoised where, behind earth's rim, the sun has set.Your voice has sung across my heart, but numbAnd mute, I have no tones to answer. FarWithin I kneel before you, speechless yet,And life ablaze with beauty, I am dumb.
How empty seems the town now you are gone!A wilderness of sad streets, where gaunt wallsHide nothing to desire; sunshine fallsEery, distorted, as it long had shoneOn white, dead faces tombed in halls of stone.The whir of motors, stricken through with callsOf playing boys, floats up at intervals;But all these noises blur to one long moan.What quest is worth pursuing? And how strangeThat other men still go accustomed ways!I hate their interest in the things they do.A spectre-horde repeating without changeAn old routine. Alone I know the daysAre still-born, and the world stopped, lacking you.
All night I wrestled with a memoryWhich knocked insurgent at the gates of thought.The crumbled wreck of years behind has wroughtIts disillusion; now I only cryFor peace, for power to forget the lieWhich hope too long has whispered. So I soughtThe sleep which would not come, and night was fraughtWith old emotions weeping silently.I heard your voice again, and knew the thingsWhich you had promised proved an empty vaunt.I felt your clinging hands while night's broad wingsCherished our love in darkness. From the lawnA sudden, quivering birdnote, like a taunt.My arms held nothing but the empty dawn.
I learnt to write to you in happier days,And every letter was a piece I chippedFrom off my heart, a fragment newly clippedFrom the mosaic of life; its blues and grays,Its throbbing reds, I gave to earn your praise.To make a pavement for your feet I strippedMy soul for you to walk upon, and slippedBeneath your steps to soften all your ways.But now my letters are like blossoms paleWe strew upon a grave with hopeless tears.I ask no recompense, I shall not failAlthough you do not heed; the long, sad yearsStill pass, and still I scatter flowers frail,And whisper words of love which no one hears.
Throughout the echoing chambers of my brainI hear your words in mournful cadence tollLike some slow passing-bell which warns the soulOf sundering darkness. Unrelenting, fainTo batter down resistance, fall againStroke after stroke, insistent diastole,The bitter blows of truth, until the wholeIs hammered into fact made strangely plain.Where shall I look for comfort? Not to you.Our worlds are drawn apart, our spirit's sunsDivided, and the light of mine burnt dim.Now in the haunted twilight I must doYour will. I grasp the cup which over-runs,And with my trembling lips I touch the rim.
"'I can't get out', said the starling."Sterne's 'Sentimental Journey'.
Forever the impenetrable wallOf self confines my poor rebellious soul,I never see the towering white clouds rollBefore a sturdy wind, save through the smallBarred window of my jail. I live a thrallWith all my outer life a clipped, square hole,Rectangular; a fraction of a scrollUnwound and winding like a worsted ball.My thoughts are grown uneager and depressedThrough being always mine, my fancy's wingsAre moulted and the feathers blown away.I weary for desires never guessed,For alien passions, strange imaginings,To be some other person for a day.
White, glittering sunlight fills the market square,Spotted and sprigged with shadows. Double rowsOf bartering booths spread out their tempting showsOf globed and golden fruit, the morning airSmells sweet with ripeness, on the pavement thereA wicker basket gapes and overflowsSpilling out cool, blue plums. The market glows,And flaunts, and clatters in its busy care.A stately minster at the northern sideLifts its twin spires to the distant sky,Pinnacled, carved and buttressed; through the wideArched doorway peals an organ, suddenly —Crashing, triumphant in its pregnant tide,Quenching the square in vibrant harmony.
GEORGE AUGUSTUS CLOUGHA NATIVE OF LIVERPOOL,DIED SUDDENLY OF "STRANGER'S FEVER"NOV'R 5th 1843AGED 22
He died of "Stranger's Fever" when his youthHad scarcely melted into manhood, soThe chiselled legend runs; a brother's woeLaid bare for epitaph. The savage ruthOf a sunny, bright, but alien land, uncouthWith cruel caressing dealt a mortal blow,And by this summer sea where flowers growIn tropic splendor, witness to the truthOf ineradicable race he lies.The law of duty urged that he should roam,Should sail from fog and chilly airs to skiesClear with deceitful welcome. He had comeWith proud resolve, but still his lonely eyesAched with fatigue at never seeing home.
Poor foolish monarch, vacillating, vain,Decaying victim of a race of kings,Swift Destiny shook out her purple wingsAnd caught him in their shadow; not againCould furtive plotting smear another stainAcross his tarnished honour. SmoulderingsOf sacrificial fires burst their ringsAnd blotted out in smoke his lost domain.Bereft of courtiers, only with his queen,From empty palace down to empty quay.No challenge screamed from hostile carabine.A single vessel waited, shadowy;All night she ploughed her solitary wayBeneath the stars, and through a tranquil sea.
Great master! Boyish, sympathetic man!Whose orbed and ripened genius lightly hungFrom life's slim, twisted tendril and there swungIn crimson-sphered completeness; guardianOf crystal portals through whose openings fanThe spiced winds which blew when earth was young,Scattering wreaths of stars, as Jove once flungA golden shower from heights cerulean.Crumbled before thy majesty we bow.Forget thy empurpled state, thy panoplyOf greatness, and be merciful and near;A youth who trudged the highroad we tread nowSinging the miles behind him; so may weFaint throbbings of thy music overhear.
The Boston Athenaeum
Thou dear and well-loved haunt of happy hours,How often in some distant gallery,Gained by a little painful spiral stair,Far from the halls and corridors where throngThe crowd of casual readers, have I passedLong, peaceful hours seated on the floorOf some retired nook, all lined with books,Where reverie and quiet reign supreme!Above, below, on every side, high shelvedFrom careless grasp of transient interest,Stand books we can but dimly see, their charmMuch greater that their titles are unread;While on a level with the dusty floorOthers are ranged in orderly confusion,And we must stoop in painful posture whileWe read their names and learn their histories.The little gallery winds round aboutThe middle of a most secluded room,Midway between the ceiling and the floor.A type of those high thoughts, which while we readHover between the earth and furthest heavenAs fancy wills, leaving the printed page;For books but give the theme, our hearts the rest,Enriching simple words with unguessed harmonyAnd overtones of thought we only know.And as we sit long hours quietly,Reading at times, and at times simply dreaming,The very room itself becomes a friend,The confidant of intimate hopes and fears;A place where are engendered pleasant thoughts,And possibilities before unguessedCome to fruition born of sympathy.And as in some gay garden stretched uponA genial southern slope, warmed by the sun,The flowers give their fragrance joyouslyTo the caressing touch of the hot noon;So books give up the all of what they meanOnly in a congenial atmosphere,Only when touched by reverent hands, and readBy those who love and feel as well as think.For books are more than books, they are the life,The very heart and core of ages past,The reason why men lived, and worked, and died,The essence and quintessence of their lives.And we may know them better, and divineThe inner motives whence their actions sprang,Far better than the men who only knewTheir bodily presence, the soul forever hidFrom those with no ability to see.They wait here quietly for us to comeAnd find them out, and know them for our friends;These men who toiled and wrote only for this,To leave behind such modicum of truthAs each perceived and each alone could tell.Silently waiting that from time to timeIt may be given them to illuminateDull daily facts with pristine radianceFor some long-waited-for affinityWho lingers yet in the deep womb of time.The shifting sun pierces the young green leavesOf elm trees, newly coming into bud,And splashes on the floor and on the booksThrough old, high, rounded windows, dim with age.The noisy city-sounds of modern lifeFloat softened to us across the old graveyard.The room is filled with a warm, mellow light,No garish colours jar on our content,The books upon the shelves are old and worn.'T was no belated effort nor attemptTo keep abreast with old as well as newThat placed them here, tricked in a modern guise,Easily got, and held in light esteem.Our fathers' fathers, slowly and carefullyGathered them, one by one, when they were newAnd a delighted world received their thoughtsHungrily; while we but love the more,Because they are so old and grown so dear!The backs of tarnished gold, the faded boards,The slightly yellowing page, the strange old type,All speak the fashion of another age;The thoughts peculiar to the man who wroteArrayed in garb peculiar to the time;As though the idiom of a man were caughtImprisoned in the idiom of a race.A nothing truly, yet a link that bindsAll ages to their own inheritance,And stretching backward, dim and dimmer still,Is lost in a remote antiquity.Grapes do not come of thorns nor figs of thistles,And even a great poet's divinest thoughtIs coloured by the world he knows and sees.The little intimate things of every day,The trivial nothings that we think not of,These go to make a part of each man's life;As much a part as do the larger thoughtsHe takes account of. Nay, the little thingsOf daily life it is which mold, and shape,And make him apt for noble deeds and true.And as we read some much-loved masterpiece,Read it as long ago the author read,With eyes that brimmed with tears as he sawThe message he believed in stamped in typeInviolable for the slow-coming years;We know a certain subtle sympathy,We seem to clasp his hand across the past,His words become related to the time,He is at one with his own glorious creedAnd all that in his world was dared and done.The long, still, fruitful hours slip awayShedding their influences as they pass;We know ourselves the richer to have satUpon this dusty floor and dreamed our dreams.No other place to us were quite the same,No other dreams so potent in their charm,For this is ours! Every twist and turnOf every narrow stair is known and loved;Each nook and cranny is our very own;The dear, old, sleepy place is full of spellsFor us, by right of long inheritance.The building simply bodies forth a thoughtPeculiarly inherent to the race.And we, descendants of that elder time,Have learnt to love the very form in whichThe thought has been embodied to our years.And here we feel that we are not alone,We too are one with our own richest past;And here that veiled, but ever smouldering fireOf race, which rarely seen yet never dies,Springs up afresh and warms us with its heat.And must they take away this treasure house,To us so full of thoughts and memories;To all the world beside a dismal placeLacking in all this modern age requiresTo tempt along the unfamiliar pathsAnd leafy lanes of old time literatures?It takes some time for moss and vines to growAnd warmly cover gaunt and chill stone wallsOf stately buildings from the cold North Wind.The lichen of affection takes as long,Or longer, ere it lovingly enfoldsA place which since without it were bereft,All stript and bare, shorn of its chiefest grace.For what to us were halls and corridorsHowever large and fitting, if we partWith this which is our birthright; if we loseA sentiment profound, unsoundable,Which Time's slow ripening alone can make,And man's blind foolishness so quickly mar.
Sea Shell, Sea Shell,Sing me a song, O Please!A song of ships, and sailor men,And parrots, and tropical trees,Of islands lost in the Spanish MainWhich no man ever may find again,Of fishes and corals under the waves,And seahorses stabled in great green caves.Sea Shell, Sea Shell,Sing of the things you know so well.
Near where I live there is a lakeAs blue as blue can be, winds makeIt dance as they go blowing by.I think it curtseys to the sky.It's just a lake of lovely flowersAnd my Mamma says they are ours;But they are not like those we growTo be our very own, you know.We have a splendid garden, thereAre lots of flowers everywhere;Roses, and pinks, and four o'clocksAnd hollyhocks, and evening stocks.Mamma lets us pick them, but neverMust we pick any gentians — ever!For if we carried them awayThey'd die of homesickness that day.
My Grandpapa lives in a wonderful houseWith a great many windows and doors,There are stairs that go up, and stairs that go down,And such beautiful, slippery floors.But of all of the rooms, even mother's and mine,And the bookroom, and parlour and all,I like the green dining-room so much the bestBecause of its ceiling and wall.Right over your head is a funny round holeWith apples and pears falling through;There's a big bunch of grapes all purply and sweet,And melons and pineapples too.They tumble and tumble, but never come downThough I've stood underneath a long whileWith my mouth open wide, for I always have hopedJust a cherry would drop from the pile.No matter how early I run there to lookIt has always begun to fall through;And one night when at bedtime I crept in to see,It was falling by candle-light too.I am sure they are magical fruits, and each oneMakes you hear things, or see things, or goForever invisible; but it's no use,And of course I shall just never know.For the ladder's too heavy to lift, and the chairsAre not nearly so tall as I need.I've given up hope, and I feel I shall dieWithout having accomplished the deed.It's a little bit sad, when you seem very nearTo adventures and things of that sort,Which nearly begin, and then don't; and you knowIt is only because you are short.
Slipping softly through the skyLittle horned, happy moon,Can you hear me up so high?Will you come down soon?On my nursery window-sillWill you stay your steady flight?And then float away with meThrough the summer night?Brushing over tops of trees,Playing hide and seek with stars,Peeping up through shiny cloudsAt Jupiter or Mars.I shall fill my lap with rosesGathered in the milky way,All to carry home to mother.Oh! what will she say!Little rocking, sailing moon,Do you hear me shout — Ahoy!Just a little nearer, moon,To please a little boy.
High up in the apple tree climbing I go,With the sky above me, the earth below.Each branch is the step of a wonderful stairWhich leads to the town I see shining up there.Climbing, climbing, higher and higher,The branches blow and I see a spire,The gleam of a turret, the glint of a dome,All sparkling and bright, like white sea foam.On and on, from bough to bough,The leaves are thick, but I push my way through;Before, I have always had to stop,But to-day I am sure I shall reach the top.Today to the end of the marvelous stair,Where those glittering pinacles flash in the air!Climbing, climbing, higher I go,With the sky close above me, the earth far below.
Naughty little speckled trout,Can't I coax you to come out?Is it such great fun to playIn the water every day?Do you pull the Naiads' hairHiding in the lilies there?Do you hunt for fishes' eggs,Or watch tadpoles grow their legs?Do the little trouts have schoolIn some deep sun-glinted pool,And in recess play at tagRound that bed of purple flag?I have tried so hard to catch you,Hours and hours I've sat to watch you;But you never will come out,Naughty little speckled trout!
He shouts in the sails of the ships at sea,He steals the down from the honeybee,He makes the forest trees rustle and sing,He twirls my kite till it breaks its string.Laughing, dancing, sunny wind,Whistling, howling, rainy wind,North, South, East and West,Each is the wind I like the best.He calls up the fog and hides the hills,He whirls the wings of the great windmills,The weathercocks love him and turn to discoverHis whereabouts — but he's gone, the rover!Laughing, dancing, sunny wind,Whistling, howling, rainy wind,North, South, East and West,Each is the wind I like the best.The pine trees toss him their cones with glee,The flowers bend low in courtesy,Each wave flings up a shower of pearls,The flag in front of the school unfurls.Laughing, dancing, sunny wind,Whistling, howling, rainy wind,North, South, East and West,Each is the wind I like the best.
By day you cannot see the skyFor it is up so very high.You look and look, but it's so blueThat you can never see right through.But when night comes it is quite plain,And all the stars are there again.They seem just like old friends to me,I've known them all my life you see.There is the dipper first, and thereIs Cassiopeia in her chair,Orion's belt, the Milky Way,And lots I know but cannot say.One group looks like a swarm of bees,Papa says they're the Pleiades;But I think they must be the toyOf some nice little angel boy.Perhaps his jackstones which to-dayHe has forgot to put away,And left them lying on the skyWhere he will find them bye and bye.I wish he'd come and play with me.We'd have such fun, for it would beA most unusual thing for boysTo feel that they had stars for toys!
THE END
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(These are taken from the back of the 1916 printing.)
A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass
By AMY LOWELL New edition, cloth, $1.25
PRESS NOTICES
"These poems arouse interest, and justify it by the result. Miss Lowell is the sister of President Lowell of Harvard. Her art, however, needs no reflection from such distinguished influence to make apparent its distinction. Such verse as this is delightful, has a sort of personal flavour, a loyalty to the fundamentals of life and nationality. . . . The child poems are particularly graceful." — 'Boston Evening Transcript', Boston, Mass.
"Miss Lowell has given expression in exquisite form to many beautiful thoughts, inspired by a variety of subjects and based on some of the loftiest ideals. . . .
"The verses are grouped under the captions 'Lyrical Poems', 'Sonnets', and 'Verses for Children'. . . .
"It is difficult to say which of these are the most successful. Indeed, all reveal Miss Lowell's powers of observation from the view-point of a lover of nature. Moreover, Miss Lowell writes with a gentle philosophy and a deep knowledge of humanity. . . .
"The sonnets are especially appealing and touch the heart strings so tenderly that there comes immediate response in the same spirit. . . .
"That she knows the workings of the juvenile mind is plainly indicated by her verses written for their reading." — 'Boston Sunday Globe', Boston, Mass.
"A quite delightful little collection of verses." — 'Toronto Globe', Toronto, Canada.
"The Lyrics are true to the old definition; they would sing well to the accompaniment of the strings. We should like to hear "Hora Stellatrix" rendered by an artist." — 'Hartford Courant', Hartford, Conn.
"Verses that show delicate appreciation of the beautiful, and imaginative quality. A sonnet entitled 'Dreams' is peculiarly full of sympathy and feeling." — 'The Sun', Baltimore, Md.
—————
By the same author Sword Blades and Poppy Seed Price, $1.25
Opinions of Leading Reviewers
"Against the multitudinous array of daily verse our times produce this volume utters itself with a range and brilliancy wholly remarkable. I cannot see that Miss Lowell's use of unrhymed 'vers libre' has been surpassed in English. Read 'The Captured Goddess', 'Music', and 'The Precinct. Rochester', a piece of mastercraft in this kind. A wealth of subtleties and sympathies, gorgeously wrought, full of macabre effects (as many of the poems are) and brilliantly worked out. The things of splendor she has made she will hardly outdo in their kind." — Josephine Preston Peabody, 'The Boston Herald'.
"For quaint pictorial exactitude and bizarrerie of color these poems remind one of Flemish masters and Dutch tulip gardens; again, they are fine and fantastic, like Venetian glass; and they are all curiously flooded with the moonlight of dreams. . . . Miss Lowell has a remarkable gift of what one might call the dramatic-decorative. Her decorative imagery is intensely dramatic, and her dramatic pictures are in themselves vivid and fantastic decorations." — Richard Le Gallienne, 'New York Times Book Review'.
"The book as a whole is notable for the organic relation it bears to life and to art. Miss Lowell can find authentic inspiration equally in the lapidarian stanzas of Henri de Regnier and in the color effects produced by the flicking of the tail of the great northern pike. Her work is always vivid, sincere, poetically energetic. Throughout it run, in the quaint phrase of an old poet, 'bright shoots of everlastingnesse'." — Ferris Greenslet, in the 'New Republic'.
"Such poems as 'A Lady', 'Music', 'White and Green', are well-nigh flawless in their beauty — perfect 'images'." — Harriet Monroe, 'Poetry'.