HELENA.

Last night I saw Helena. She whose praiseOf late all men have sounded. She for whomYoung Angus rashly sought a silent tombRather than live without her all his days.Wise men go mad who look upon her long,She is so ripe with dangers. Yet meanwhileI find no fascination in her smile,Although I make her theme of this poor song."Her golden tresses?" yes, they may be fair,And yet to me each shining silken tressSeems robbed of beauty and all lusterless—Too many hands have stroked Helena's hair.(I know a little maiden so demureShe will not let her one true lover's handsIn playful fondness touch her soft brown bands,So dainty‑minded is she, and so pure.)"Her great dark eyes that flash like gems at night?Large, long‑lashed eyes and lustrous?" that may be,And yet they are not beautiful to me.Too many hearts have sunned in their delight.(I mind me of two tender blue eyes, hidSo underneath white curtains, and so veiledThat I have sometimes plead for hours, and failedTo see more than the shyly lifted lid.)"Her perfect mouth so like a carvèd kiss?""Her honeyed mouth, where hearts do, fly‑like, drown?"I would not taste its sweetness for a crown;Too many lips have drank its nectared bliss.(I know a mouth whose virgin dew, undried,Lies like a young grape's bloom, untouched and sweet,And though I plead in passion at her feet,She would not let me brush it if I died.)In vain, Helena! though wise men may vieFor thy rare smile or die from loss of it,Armored by my sweet lady's trust, I sit,And know thou art not worth her faintest sigh.

Nothing remains of unrecorded agesThat lie in the silent cemetery of time;Their wisdom may have shamed our wisest sages,Their glory may have been indeed sublime.How weak do seem our strivings after power,How poor the grandest efforts of our brains,If out of all we are, in one short hourNothing remains.Nothing remains but the Eternal Spaces,Time and decay uproot the forest trees.Even the mighty mountains leave their places,And sink their haughty heads beneath strange seas;The great earth writhes in some convulsive spasmAnd turns the proudest cities into plains.The level sea becomes a yawning chasm—Nothing remains.Nothing remains but the Eternal Forces,The sad seas cease complaining and grow dry;Rivers are drained and altered in their courses,Great stars pass out and vanish from the sky.Ideas die and old religions perish,Our rarest pleasures and our keenest painsAre swept away with all we hate or cherish—Nothing remains.Nothing remains but the Eternal NamelessAnd all‑creative spirit of the Law,Uncomprehended, comprehensive, blameless,Invincible, resistless, with no flaw;So full of love it must create forever,Destroying that it may create againPersistent and perfecting in endeavor,It yet must bring forth angels, after men—This, this remains.

Lean down and lift me higher, Josephine!From the Eternal Hills hast thou not seenHow I do strive for heights? but lacking wings,I cannot grasp at once those better thingsTo which I in my inmost soul aspire.Lean down and lift me higher.I grope along—not desolate or sad,For youth and hope and health all keep me glad;But too bright sunlight, sometimes, makes us blind,And I do grope for heights I cannot find.Oh, thou must know my one supreme desire—Lean down and lift me higher.Not long ago we trod the self‑same way.Thou knowest how, from day to fleeting dayOur souls were vexed with trifles, and our feet,Were lured aside to by‑paths which seemed sweet,But only served to hinder and to tire;Lean down and lift me higher.Thou hast gone onward to the heights serene,And left me here, my loved one, Josephine;I am content to stay until the end,For life is full of promise; but, my friend,Canst thou not help me in my best desireAnd lean, and lift me higher?Frail as thou wert, thou hast grown strong and wise,And quick to understand and sympathizeWith all a full soul's needs. It must be so,Thy year with God hath made thee great I know.Thou must see how I struggle and aspire—Oh, warm me with a breath of heavenly fire,And lean, and lift me higher.

I and my Soul are alone to‑day,All in the shining weather;We were sick of the world, and we put it away,So we could rejoice together.Our host, the Sun, in the blue, blue skyIs mixing a rare, sweet wine,In the burnished gold of his cup on high,For me, and this Soul of mine.We find it a safe and royal drink,And a cure for every pain;It helps us to love, and helps us to think,And strengthens body and brain.And sitting here, with my Soul alone,Where the yellow sun‑rays fall,Of all the friends I have ever knownI find it thebestof all.We rarely meet when the World is near,For the World hath a pleasing artAnd brings me so much that is bright and dearThat my Soul it keepeth apart.But when I grow weary of mirth and glee,Of glitter, and glow, and splendor,Like a tried old friend it comes to me,With a smile that is sad and tender.And we walk together as two friends may,And laugh, and drink God's wine.Oh, a royal comrade any dayI find this Soul of mine.

Now, while thy rounded cheek is fresh and fair,While beauty lingers, laughing, in thine eyes,Ere thy young heart shall meet the stranger, "Care,"Or thy blithe soul become the home of sighs,Were it not kindness should I give thee restBy plunging this sharp dagger in thy breast?Dying so young, with all thy wealth of youth,What part of life wouldst thou not claim, in sooth?Only the woe,Sweetheart, that sad souls know.Now, in this sacred hour of supreme trust,Of pure delight and palpitating joy,Ere change can come, as come it surely must,With jarring doubts and discords, to destroyOur far too perfect peace, I pray thee, Sweet,Were it not best for both of us, and meet,If I should bring swift death to seal our bliss?Dying so full of joy, what could we miss?Nothing but tears,Sweetheart, and weary years.How slight the action! Just one well‑aimed blowHere where I feel thy warm heart's pulsing beat,And then another through my own, and soOur perfect union would be made complete:So past all parting, I should claim thee mine.Dead with our youth, and faith, and love divine,Should we not keep the best of life that way?What shall we gain by living day on day?What shall we gain,Sweetheart, but bitter pain?

I feel the great immensity of life.All little aims slip from me, and I reachMy yearning soul toward the Infinite.As when a mighty forest, whose green leavesHave shut it in, and made it seem a bowerFor lovers' secrets, or for children's sports,Casts all its clustering foliage to the winds,And lets the eye behold it, limitless,And full of winding mysteries of ways:So now with life that reaches out before,And borders on the unexplained Beyond.I see the stars above me, world on world:I hear the awful language of all Space;I feel the distant surging of great seas,That hide the secrets of the UniverseIn their eternal bosoms; and I knowThat I am but an atom of the Whole.

[In an interview with Lawrence Barrett, he said: "The literature of the New World must look to the West for its poetry."]Not to the crowded East,Where, in a well‑worn groove,Like the harnessed wheel of a great machine,The trammeled mind must move—Where Thought must follow the fashion of Thought,Or be counted vulgar and set at naught.Not to the languid South,Where the mariners of the brainAre lured by the Sirens of the Sense,And wrecked upon its main—Where Thought is rocked, on the sweet wind's breath,To a torpid sleep that ends in death.But to the mighty West,That chosen realm of God,Where Nature reaches her hands to men,And Freedom walks abroad—Where mind is King, and fashion is naught:There shall the New World look for thought.To the West, the beautiful West,She shall look, and not in vain—For out of its broad and boundless storeCome muscle, and nerve, and brain.Let the bards of the East and the South be dumb—For out of the West shall the Poets come.They shall come with souls as greatAs the cradle where they were rocked;They shall come with brows that are touched with fire,Like the Gods with whom they have walked;They shall come from the West in royal state,The Singers and Thinkers for whom we wait.

[In an interview with Lawrence Barrett, he said: "The literature of the New World must look to the West for its poetry."]

I set out for the Land of Content,By the gay crowded pleasure‑highway,With laughter, and jesting, I wentWith the mirth‑loving throng for a day;Then I knew I had wandered astray,For I met returned pilgrims, belated,Who said, "We are weary and sated,But we found not the Land of Content."I turned to the steep path of fame,I said, "It is over yon height—This land with the beautiful name—Ambition will lend me its light."But I paused in my journey ere night,For the way grew so lonely and troubled;I said—my anxiety doubled—"This is not the road to Content."Then I joined the great rabble and throngThat frequents the moneyed world's mart;But the greed, and the grasping and wrong,Left me only one wish—to depart.And sickened, and saddened at heart,I hurried away from the gateway,For my soul and my spirit said straightway,"This is not the road to Content."Then weary in body and brain,An overgrown path I detected,And I said "I will hide with my painIn this by‑way, unused and neglected."Lo! it led to the realm God selectedTo crown with his best gifts of beauty,And through the dark pathway of dutyI came to the land of Content.

In the rapture of life and of living,I lift up my heart and rejoice,And I thank the great Giver for givingThe soul of my gladness a voice.In the glow of the glorious weather,In the sweet‑scented sensuous air,My burdens seem light as a feather—They are nothing to bear.In the strength and the glory of power,In the pride and the pleasure of wealth,(For who dares dispute me my dowerOf talents and youth‑time and health?)I can laugh at the world and its sages—I am greater than seers who are sad,For he is most wise in all agesWho knows how to be glad.I lift up my eyes to Apollo,The god of the beautiful days,And my spirit soars off like a swallowAnd is lost in the light of its rays.Are you troubled and sad? I beseech youCome out of the shadows of strife—Come out in the sun while I teach youThe secret of life.Come out of the world—come above it—Up over its crosses and graves,Though the green earth is fair and I love it,We must love it as masters, not slaves.Come up where the dust never rises—But only the perfume of flowers—And your life shall be glad with surprisesOf beautiful hours.Come up where the rare golden wine isApollo distills in my sight,And your life shall be happy as mine is,And as full of delight.

High in the heavens I saw the moon this morning,Albeit the sun shone bright;Unto my soul it spoke, in voice of warning,"Remember Night!"

Thou Christ of mine, thy gracious ear low bendingThrough these glad New Year days,To catch the countless prayers to Heaven ascending—For e'en hard hearts do raiseSome secret wish for fame, or gold, or power,Or freedom from all care—Dear, patient Christ, who listeneth hour on hour,Hear now a Christian's prayer.Let this young year that, silent, walks beside me,Be as a means of graceTo lead me up, no matter what betide me,Nearer the Master's face.If it need be that ere I reach the fountainWhere Living waters play,My feet should bleed from sharp stones on the mountain,Then cast them in my way.If my vain soul needs blows and bitter lossesTo shape it for thy crown,Then bruise it, burn it, burden it with crosses,With sorrows bear it down.Do what thou wilt to mold me to thy pleasure,And if I should complain,Heap full of anguish yet another measureUntil I smile at pain.Send dangers—deaths! but tell me how to dare them;Enfold me in thy care.Send trials, tears! but give me strength to bear them—This is a Christian's prayer.

Sometimes at night, when I sit and write,I hear the strangest things,—As my brain grows hot with burning thought,That struggles for form and wings,I can hear the beat of my swift blood's feet,As it speeds with a rush and a whirFrom heart to brain and back again,Like a race‑horse under the spur.With my soul's fine ear I listen and hearThe tender Silence speak,As it leans on the breast of Night to rest,And presses his dusky cheek.And the darkness turns in its sleep, and yearnsFor something that is kin;And I hear the hiss of a scorching kiss,As it folds and fondles Sin.In its hurrying race through leagues of space,I can hear the Earth catch breath,As it heaves and moans, and shudders and groans,And longs for the rest of Death.And high and far, from a distant star,Whose name is unknown to me,I hear a voice that says, "Rejoice,For I keep ward o'er thee!"Oh, sweet and strange are the sounds that rangeThrough the chambers of the night;And the watcher who waits by the dim, dark gates,May hear, if he lists aright.

God measures souls by their capacityFor entertaining his best Angel, Love.Who loveth most is nearest kin to God,Who is all Love, or Nothing.He who sitsAnd looks out on the palpitating world,And feels his heart swell in him large enoughTo hold all men within it, he is nearHis great Creator's standard, though he dwellsOutside the pale of churches, and knows notA feast‑day from a fast‑day, or a lineOf Scripture even. What God wants of usIs that outreaching bigness that ignoresAll littleness of aims, or loves, or creeds,And clasps all Earth and Heaven in its embrace.

Let the old snow be covered with the new:The trampled snow, so soiled, and stained, and sodden.Let it be hidden wholly from our viewBy pure white flakes, all trackless and untrodden.When Winter dies, low at the sweet Spring's feet,Let him be mantled in a clean, white sheet.Let the old life be covered by the new:The old past life so full of sad mistakes,Let it be wholly hidden from the viewBy deeds as white and silent as snow‑flakes.Ere this earth life melts in the eternal SpringLet the white mantle of repentance, flingSoft drapery about it, fold on fold,Even as the new snow covers up the old.

[Read at Re‑union of the G. A. T., Madison, Wis., July 4, 1872.]After the battles are over,And the war drums cease to beat,And no more is heard on the hillsideThe sound of hurrying feet,Full many a noble action,That was done in the days of strife,By the soldier is half forgotten,In the peaceful walks of life.Just as the tangled grasses,In Summer's warmth and light,Grow over the graves of the fallenAnd hide them away from sight,So many an act of valor,And many a deed sublime,Fade from the mind of the soldier,O'ergrown by the grass of time.Not so should they be rewarded,Those noble deeds of old;They should live forever and ever,When the heroes' hearts are cold.Then rally, ye brave old comrades,Old veterans, re‑unite!Uproot Time's tangled grasses—Live over the march, and the fight.Let Grant come up from the White House,And clasp each brother's hand,First chieftain of the army,Last chieftain of the land.Let him rest from a nation's burdens,And go, in thought, with his men,Through the fire and smoke of Shiloh,And save the day again.This silent hero of battlesKnew no such word as defeat.It was left for the rebels' learning,Along with the word—retreat.He was not given to talking,But he found that guns would preachIn a way that was more convincingThan fine and flowery speech.Three cheers for the grave commanderOf the grand old Tennessee!Who won the first great battle—Gained the first great victory.His motto was always "Conquer,""Success" was his countersign,And "though it took all Summer,"He kept fighting upon "that line."Let Sherman, the stern old General,Come rallying with his men;Let them march once more through GeorgiaAnd down to the sea again.Oh! that grand old tramp to Savannah,Three hundred miles to the coast,It will live in the heart of the nation,Forever its pride and boast.As Sheridan went to the battle,When a score of miles away,He has come to the feast and banquet,By the iron horse, to‑day.Its pace is not much swifterThan the pace of that famous steedWhich bore him down to the contestAnd saved the day by his speed.Then go over the ground to‑day, boys,Tread each remembered spot.It will be a gleesome journey,On the swift‑shod feet of thought;You can fight a bloodless battle,You can skirmish along the route,But it's not worth while to forage,There are rations enough without.Don't start if you hear the cannon,It is not the sound of doom,It does not call to the contest—To the battle's smoke and gloom."Let us have peace," was spoken,And lo! peace ruled again;And now the nation is shouting,Through the cannon's voice, "Amen."O boys who besieged old Vicksburg,Can time e'er wash awayThe triumph of her surrender,Nine years ago to‑day?Can you ever forget the moment,When you saw the flag of white,That told how the grim old cityHad fallen in her might?Ah, 'twas a bold brave army,When the boys, with a right good will,Went gayly marching and singingTo the fight at Champion Hill.They met with a warm reception,But the soul of "Old John Brown"Was abroad on that field of battle,And our flag did NOT go down.Come, heroes of Look Out Mountain,Of Corinth and Donelson,Of Kenesaw and Atlanta,And tell how the day was won!Hush! bow the head for a moment—There are those who cannot come.No bugle‑call can arouse them—No sound of fife or drum.Oh, boys who died for the country,Oh, dear and sainted dead!What can we say about youThat has not once been said?Whether you fell in the contest,Struck down by shot and shell,Or pined 'neath the hand of sicknessOr starved in the prison cell,We know that you died for Freedom,To save our land from shame,To rescue a periled Nation,And we give you deathless fame.'T was the cause of Truth and JusticeThat you fought and perished for,And we say it, oh, so gently,"Our boys who died in the war."Saviors of our Republic,Heroes who wore the blue,We owe the peace that surrounds us—And our Nation's strength to you.We owe it to you that our banner,The fairest flag in the world,Is to‑day unstained, unsullied,On the Summer air unfurled.We look on its stripes and spangles,And our hearts are filled the whileWith love for the brave commanders,And the boys of the rank and file.The grandest deeds of valorWere never written out,The noblest acts of virtueThe world knows nothing about.And many a private soldier,Who walks his humble way,With no sounding name or title,Unknown to the world to‑day,In the eyes of God is a heroAs worthy of the bays,As any mighty GeneralTo whom the world gives praise.Brave men of a mighty army,We extend you friendship's hand!I speak for the "Loyal Women,"Those pillars of our land.We wish you a hearty welcome,We are proud that you gather hereTo talk of old times togetherOn this brightest day in the year.And if Peace, whose snow‑white pinions,Brood over our land to‑day,Should ever again go from us,(God grant she may ever stay!)Should our Nation call in her perilFor "Six hundred thousand more,"The loyal women would hear her,And send you out as before.We would bring out the treasured knapsack,We would take the sword from the wall,And hushing our own hearts' pleadings,Hear only the country's call.For next to our God, is our Nation;And we cherish the honored name,Of the bravest of all brave armiesWho fought for that Nation's fame.

[Read at Re‑union of the G. A. T., Madison, Wis., July 4, 1872.]

I hold it the duty of one who is gifted,And specially dowered in all men's sight,To know no rest till his life is liftedFully up to his great gifts' height.He must mold the man into rare completeness,For gems are set only in gold refined.He must fashion his thoughts into perfect sweetness,And cast out folly and pride from his mind.For he who drinks from a god's gold fountainOf art or music or rhythmic songMust sift from his soul the chaff of malice,And weed from his heart the roots of wrong.Great gifts should be worn, like a crown befitting!And not like gems in a beggar's hands.And the toil must be constant and unremittingWhich lifts up the king to the crown's demands.

I have been across the bridges of the years.Wet with tearsWere the ties on which I trod, going backDown the trackTo the valley where I left, 'neath skies of Truth,My lost youth.As I went, I dropped my burdens, one and all—Let them fall;All my sorrows, all my wrinkles, all my care,My white hair,I laid down, like some lone pilgrim's heavy pack,By the track.As I neared the happy valley with light feet,My heart beatTo the rhythm of a song I used to knowLong ago,And my spirits gushed and bubbled like a fountainDown a mountain.On the border of that valley I found you,Tried and true;And we wandered through the golden Summer‑LandHand in hand.And my pulses beat with rapture in the blissesOf your kisses.And we met there, in those green and verdant places,Smiling faces,And sweet laughter echoed upward from the dellsLike gold bells.And the world was spilling over with the gloryOf Youth's story.It was but a dreamer's journey of the brain;And againI have left the happy valley far behind;And I findTime stands waiting with his burdens in a packFor my back.As he speeds me, like a rough, well‑meaning friend,To the end,Will I find again the lost ones loved so well?Who can tell!But the dead know what the life will be to come—And they are dumb!

As some dusk mother shields from all alarmsThe tired child she gathers to her breast,The brunette Night doth fold me in her arms,And hushes me to perfect peace and rest.Her eyes of stars shine on me, and I hearHer voice of winds low crooning on my ear.O Night, O Night, how beautiful thou art!Come, fold me closer to thy pulsing heart.The day is full of gladness, and the lightSo beautifies the common outer things,I only see with my external sight,And only hear the great world's voice which ringsBut silently from daylight and from dinThe sweet Night draws me—whispers, "Look within!"And looking, as one wakened from a dream,I see whatis—no longer what doth seem.The Night says, "Listen!" and upon my earRevealed, as are the visions to my sight,The voices known as "Beautiful" come nearAnd whisper of the vastly Infinite.Great, blue‑eyed Truth, her sister Purity,Their brother Honor, all converse with me,And kiss my brow, and say, "Be brave of heart!"O holy three! how beautiful thou art!The Night says, "Child, sleep that thou may'st ariseStrong for to‑morrow's struggle." And I feelHer shadowy fingers pressing on my eyes:Like thistledown I float to the Ideal—The Slumberland, made beautiful and brightAs death, by dreams of loved ones gone from sight,O food for soul's, sweet dreams of pure delight,How beautiful the holy hours of Night!

The world grows green on a thousand hills—By a thousand willows the bees are humming,And a million birds by a million rills,Sing of the golden season coming.But, gazing out on the sun‑kist lea,And hearing a thrush and a blue‑bird singing,I feel that the Summer is all for me,And all for me are the joys it is bringing.All for me the bumble‑beeDrones his song in the perfect weather;And, just on purpose to sing to me,Thrush and blue‑bird came North together.Just for me, in red and white,Bloom and blossom the fields of clover;And all for me and my delightThe wild Wind follows and plays the lover.The mighty sun, with a scorching kiss(I have read, and heard, and do not doubt it)Has burned up a thousand worlds like this,And never stopped to think about it.And yet I believe he hurries upJust on purpose to kiss my flowers—To drink the dew from the lily‑cup,And help it to grow through golden hours.I know I am only a speck of dust,An individual mite of masses,Clinging upon the outer crustOf a little ball of cooling gases.And yet, and yet, say what you will,And laugh, if you please, at my lack of reason,For me wholly, and for me still,Blooms and blossoms the Summer season.Nobody else has ever heardThe story the Wind to me discloses;And none but I and the humming‑birdCan read the hearts of the crimson roses.Ah, my Summer—my love—my own!The world grows glad in your smiling weather;Yet all for me, and me alone,You and your Court came north together.

At morn the wise man walked abroad,Proud with the learning of great fools.He laughed and said, "There is no God—'Tis force creates, 'tis reason rules."Meek with the wisdom of great faith,At night he knelt while angels smiled,And wept and cried with anguished breath,"Jehovah,God, save thou my child."

Last night I knelt low at my lady's feet.One soft, caressing hand played with my hair,And one I kissed and fondled. Kneeling there,I deemed my meed of happiness complete.She was so fair, so full of witching wiles—Of fascinating tricks of mouth and eye;So womanly withal, but not too shy—And all my heaven was compassed by her smiles.Her soft touch on my cheek and forehead sent,Like little arrows, thrills of tendernessThrough all my frame. I trembled with excessOf love, and sighed the sigh of great content.When any mortal dares to so rejoice,I think a jealous Heaven, bending low,Reaches a stern hand forth and deals a blow.Sweet through the dusk I heard my lady's voice."My love!" she sighed, "My Carlos!" even nowI feel the perfumed zephyr of her breathBearing to me those words of living death,And starting out the cold drops on my brow.For I amPaul—not Carlos! Who is heThat, in the supreme hour of love's delight,Veiled by the shadows of the falling night,She should breathe low his name, forgetting me?I will not ask her! 'twere a fruitless task,For, woman‑like, she would make me believeSome well‑told tale; and sigh, and seem to grieve,And call me cruel. Nay, I will not ask.But this man Carlos, whosoe'er he be,Has turned my cup of nectar into gall,Since I know he has claimed some one or allOf these delights my lady grants to me.He must have knelt and kissed her, in some sadAnd tender twilight, when the day grew dim.How else could I remind her so of him?Why, reveries like these have made men mad!He must have felt her soft hand on his brow.If Heaven was shocked at such presumptuous wrongs,And plunged him in the grave, where he belongs,Still she remembers, though she loves me now.And if he lives, and meets me to his cost,Why, what avails it? I must hear and seeThat curst name "Carlos" always haunting me—So has another Paradise been lost.

There sat two glasses filled to the brim,On a rich man's table, rim to rim.One was ruddy and red as blood,And one was clear as the crystal flood.Said the glass of wine to his paler brother,"Let us tell tales of the past to each other;I can tell of a banquet, and revel, and mirth,Where I was king, for I ruled in might;For the proudest and grandest souls on earthFell under my touch, as though struck with blight.From the heads of kings I have torn the crown;From the heights of fame I have hurled men down.I have blasted many an honored name;I have taken virtue and given shame;I have tempted the youth with a sip, a taste,That has made his future a barren waste.Far greater than any king am I,Or than any army beneath the sky.I have made the arm of the driver fail,And sent the train from the iron rail.I have made good ships go down at sea,And the shrieks of the lost were sweet to me.Fame, strength, wealth, genius before me fall;And my might and power are over all!Ho, ho! pale brother," said the wine,"Can you boast of deeds as great as mine?"Said the water‑glass: "I cannot boastOf a king dethroned, or a murdered host,But I can tell of hearts that were sadBy my crystal drops made bright and glad;Of thirsts I have quenched, and brows I have laved;Of hands I have cooled, and souls I have saved.I have leaped through the valley, dashed down the mountain,Slept in the sunshine, and dripped from the fountain.I have burst my cloud‑fetters, and dropped from the sky.And everywhere gladdened the prospect and eye;I have eased the hot forehead of fever and pain;I have made the parched meadows grow fertile with grain.I can tell of the powerful wheel of the mill,That ground out the flour, and turned at my will.I can tell of manhood debased by you,That I have uplifted and crowned anewI cheer, I help, I strengthen and aid;I gladden the heart of man and maid;I set the wine‑chained captive free,And all are better for knowing me."These are the tales they told each other,The glass of wine and its paler brother,As they sat together, filled to the brim,On a rich man's table, rim to rim.

An artist toiled over his pictures;He labored by night and by day.He struggled for glory and honor,But the world, it had nothing to say.His walls were ablaze with the splendorsWe see in the beautiful skies;But the world beheld only the colorsThat were made out of chemical dyes.Time sped. And he lived, loved, and suffered;He passed through the valley of grief.Again he toiled over his canvas,Since in labor alone was relief.It showed not the splendor of colorsOf those of his earlier years,But the world? the world bowed down before it,Because it was painted with tears.A poet was gifted with genius,And he sang, and he sang all the days.He wrote for the praise of the people,But the people accorded no praise.Oh, his songs were as blithe as the morning,As sweet as the music of birds;But the world had no homage to offer,Because they were nothing but words.Time sped. And the poet through sorrowBecame like his suffering kind.Again he toiled over his poemsTo lighten the grief of his mind.They were not so flowing and rhythmicAs those of his earlier years,But the world? lo! it offered its homageBecause they were written in tears.So ever the price must be givenBy those seeking glory in art;So ever the world is repayingThe grief‑stricken, suffering heart.The happy must ever be humble;Ambition must wait for the years,Ere hoping to win the approvalOf a world that looks on through its tears.

If the sad old world should jump a cogSometime, in its dizzy spinning,And go off the track with a sudden jog,What an end would come to the sinning.What a rest from strife and the burdens of lifeFor the millions of people in it,What a way out of care, and worry and wear,All in a beautiful minute.As 'round the sun with a curving sweepIt hurries and runs and races,Should it lose its balance, and go with a leapInto the vast sea‑spaces,What a blest relief it would bring to the grief,And the trouble and toil about us,To be suddenly hurled from the solar worldAnd let it go on without us.With not a sigh or a sad good‑byFor loved ones left behind us,We would go with a lunge and a mighty plungeWhere never a grave should find us.What a wild mad thrill our veins would fillAs the great earth, life a feather,Should float through the air to God knows where,And carry us all together.No dark, damp tomb and no mourner's gloom,No tolling bell in the steeple,But in one swift breath a painless deathFor a million billion people.What greater bliss could we ask than this,To sweep with a bird's free motionThrough leagues of space to a resting place,In a vast and vapory ocean—To pass away from this life for ayeWith never a dear tie sundered,And a world on fire for a funeral pyre,While the stars looked on and wondered?

Back to Index Next