There is something in the sound of drum and fifeThat stirs all the savage instincts into life.
Inthe old times of peace we went our ways,Through proper daysOf little joys and tasks. Lonely at times,When from the steeple sounded wedding chimes,Telling to all the world some maid was wife—But taking patiently our part in lifeAs it was portioned us by Church and State,Believing it our fate.Our thoughts all chasteHeld yet a secret wish to love and mateEre youth and virtue should go quite to waste.But men we criticised for lack of strength,And kept them at arm’s length.Then the war came—The world was all aflame!The men we had thought dull and void of powerWere heroes in an hour.He who had seemed a slave to petty greedShowed masterful in that great time of need.He who had plotted for his neighbour’s pelf,Now for his fellows offers up himself.And we were only women, forced by warTo sacrifice the things worth living for.
Something within us broke,Something within us woke,The wild cave-woman spoke.
When we heard the sound of drumming,As our soldiers went to camp,Heard them tramp,tramp,tramp;As we watched to see them coming,And they looked at us and smiled(Yes,looked back at us and smiled),As they filed along by hillock and by hollow,Then our hearts were so beguiledThat,for many and many a day,We dreamed we heard them say,‘Oh,follow,follow,follow!’And the distant,rolling drumCalled us‘Come,come,come!’Till our virtue seemed a thing to give away.
War had swept ten thousand years away from earth.We were primal once again.There were males, not modern men;We were females meant to bring their sons to birth.And we could not wait for any formal rite,We could hear them calling to us, ‘Come to-night;For to-morrow, at the dawn,We move on!’And the drumBellowed, ‘Come, come, come!’And the fifeWhistled, ‘Life, life, life!’
So they moved on and fought and bled and died;Honoured and mourned, they are the nation’s pride.We fought our battles, too, but with the tideOf our red blood, we gave the world new lives.Because we were not wivesWe are dishonoured. Is it noble, then,To break God’s laws only by killing menTo save one’s country from destruction?We took no man’s life but gave our chastity,And sinned the ancient sinTo plant young trees and fill felled forests in.
Oh, clergy of the land,Bible in hand,All reverently you stand,On holy thoughts intentWhile barren wives receive the sacrament!Had you the open visions you could seePhantoms of infants murdered in the womb,Who never knew a cradle or a tomb,Hovering about these wives accusingly.
Bestow the sacrament! Their sins are not well known—Ours to the four winds of the earth are blown.
Berlin, Germany, gave the school children a half holiday to celebrate the sinking of theLusitania.
Wardeclares a holiday;Little children, run and play.Ring-a-rosy round the earthWith the garland of your mirth.
Shrill a song brim full of gleeOf a great ship sunk at sea.Tell with pleasure and with prideHow a hundred children died.
Sing of orphan babes, whose criesBeat against unanswering skies;Let a mother’s mad despairLend staccato to your air.
Sing of babes who drowned alone;Sing of headstones, marked ‘Unknown’;Sing of homes made desolateWhere the stricken mourners wait.
Sing of battered corpses tossedBy the heedless waves, and lost.Run, sweet children, sing and play;War declares a holiday.
WhenI was very young I used to feel the dark despairs of youth;Out of my little griefs I would invent great tragedies and woes;Not only for myself, but for all those I held most dearI would invent vast sorrows in my melancholy moods of thought.Yet down deep, deep in my heart there was an undertone of rapture.It was like a voice from some other world calling softly to me,Saying things joyful.
As I grew older, and Life offered bitter gall for me to drink,Forcing it through clenched teeth when I refused to take it willingly;When Pain prepared some special anguish for my heart to bear,And all the things I longed for seemed to be wholly beyond my reach—Yet down deep, deep in my heart there was an undertone of rapture.It was like a Voice, a Voice from some other world calling to me,Bringing glad tidings.
Now when I look about me, and see the great injustices of men,See Idleness and Greed waited upon by luxury and mirth,See prosperous Vice ride by in state, while footsore Virtue walks;Now when I hear the cry of need rise up from lands of shameful wealth—Yet down deep, deep in my heart there is an undertone of rapture.It is like a Voice—it is a Voice—calling to me and saying:‘Love rules triumphant.’
Now when each mile-post on the path of life seems marked by headstones,And one by one dear faces that I loved are hid away from sight;Now when in each familiar home I see a vacant chair,And in the throngs once formed of friends I meet unrecognising eyes—Yet down deep, deep in my heart there is an undertone of rapture.It is the Voice, it is the Voice for ever saying unto me:‘Life is Eternal.’
Gypsying, gypsying, through the world together,Never mind the way we go, never mind what port.Follow trails, or fashion sails, start in any weather:While we journey hand in hand, everything is sport.
Gypsying, gypsying, leaving care and worry:Never mind the ‘if’ and ‘but’ (words for coward lips).Put them out with ‘fear’ and ‘doubt,’ in the pack with ‘hurry,’While we stroll like vagabonds forth to trails, or ships.
Gypsying, gypsying, just where fancy calls us;Never mind what others say, or what others do.Everywhere or foul or fair, liking what befalls us:While you have me at your side, and while I have you.
Gypsying, gypsying, camp by hill or hollow;Never mind the why of it, since it suits our mood.Go or stay, and pay our way, and let those who followFind, upspringing from the soil, some small seed of good.
Gypsying, gypsying, through the world we wander:Never mind the rushing years, that have come and gone.There must be for you and me, lying over Yonder,Other lands, where side by side we can gypsy on.
Iama Road; a good road, fair and smooth and broad;And I link with my beautiful tetherTown and Country together,Like a ribbon rolled on the earth, from the reel of God.Oh, great the life of a Road!
I am a Road; a long road, leading on and on;And I cry to the world to follow,Past meadow and hill and hollow,Through desolate night, to the open gates of dawn.Oh, bold the life of a Road!
I am a Road; a kind road, shaped by strong hands.I make strange cities neighbours;The poor grow rich with my labours,And beauty and comfort follow me through the lands.Oh, glad the life of a Road!
I am a Road; a wise road, knowing all men’s ways;And I know how each heart reachesFor the things dear Nature teaches;And I am the path that leads into green young Mays.Oh, sweet the life of a Road!
I am a Road; and I speed away from the slums,Away from desolate places,Away from unused spaces;Wherever I go, there order from chaos comes.Oh, brave the life of a Road!
I am a Road; and I would make the whole world one.I would give hope to duty,And cover the earth with beauty.Do you not see, O men! how all this might be done?So vast the power of the Road!
Tootall our structures, and too swift our pace;Not so we mount, not so we gain the race.Too loud the voice of commerce in the land;Not so truth speaks, not so we understand.Too vast our conquests, and too large our gains;Not so comes peace, not so the soul attains.
But the need of the world is a faith that will live anywhere;In the still dark depths of the woods, or out in the sun’s full glare.A faith that can hear God’s voice, alike in the quiet glen,Or in the roar of the street, and over the noises of men.
And the need of the world is a creed that is founded on joy;A creed with the turrets of hope and trust, no winds can destroy;A creed where the soul finds rest, whatever this life bestows,And dwells undoubting and unafraid, because it knows, it knows.
And the need of the world is love that burns in the heart like flame;A love for the Giver of Life, in sorrow or joy the same;A love that blazes a trail to Go through the dark and the cold,Or keeps the pathway that leads to Him clean, through glory and gold.
For the faith that can only thrive or grow in the solitude,And droops and dies in the marts of men, where sights and sounds are rude;That is not a faith at all, but a dream of a mystic’s heart;Our faith should point as the compass points, whatever be the chart.
Our faith must find its centre of peace in a babel of noise;In the changing ways of the world of men it must keep its poise;And over the sorrowing sounds of earth it must hear God’s call;And the faith that cannot do all this, that is not faith at all.
IsaidI would have my fling,And do what a young man may;And I didn’t believe a thingThat the parsons have to say.I didn’t believe in a GodThat gives us blood like fire,Then flings us into hell becauseWe answer the call of desire.
And I said: ‘Religion is rot,And the laws of the world are nil;For the bad man is he who is caughtAnd cannot foot his bill.And there is no place called hell;And heaven is only a truthWhen a man has his way with a maid,In the fresh keen hour of youth.
‘And money can buy us grace,If it rings on the plate of the church:And money can neatly eraseEach sign of a sinful smirch.’For I saw men everywhere,Hotfooting the road of vice;And women and preachers smiled on themAs long as they paid the price.
So I had my joy of life:I went the pace of the town;And then I took me a wife,And started to settle down.I had gold enough and to spareFor all of the simple joysThat belong with a house and a homeAnd a brood of girls and boys.
I married a girl with healthAnd virtue and spotless fame.I gave in exchange my wealthAnd a proud old family name.And I gave her the love of a heartGrown sated and sick of sin!My deal with the devil was all cleaned up,And the last bill handed in.
She was going to bring me a child,And when in labour she criedWith love and fear I was wild—But now I wish she had died.For the son she bore me was blindAnd crippled and weak and sore!And his mother was left a wreck.It was so she settled my score.
I said I must have my fling,And they knew the path I would go;Yet no one told me a thingOf what I needed to know.Folks talk too much of a soulFrom heavenly joys debarred—And not enough of the babes unborn,By the sins of their fathers scarred.
Thinkingof one thing all day long, at nightI fall asleep, brain weary and heart sore;But only for a little while. At three,Sometimes at two o’clock, I wake and lie,Staring out into darkness; while my thoughtsBegin the weary treadmill-toil again,From that white marriage morning of our youthDown to this dreadful hour.
I see your faceLit with the lovelight of the honeymoon;I hear your voice, that lingered on my nameAs if it loved each letter; and I feelThe clinging of your arms about my form,Your kisses on my cheek—and long to breakThe anguish of such memories with tears,But cannot weep; the fountain has run dry.
We were so young, so happy, and so fullOf keen sweet joy of life. I had no wishOutside your pleasure; and you loved me soThat when I sometimes felt a woman’s needFor more serene expression of man’s love(The need to rest in calm affection’s bayAnd not sail ever on the stormy main),Yet would I rouse myself to your desire;Meet ardent kiss with kisses just as warm;So nothing I could give should be denied.
And then our children came. Deep in my soul,From the first hour of conscious motherhood,I knew I should conserve myself for thisMost holy office; knew God meant it so.Yet even then, I held your wishes first;And by my double duties lost the bloomAnd freshness of my beauty; and beheldA look of disapproval in your eyes.But with the coming of our precious child,The lover’s smile, tinged with the father’s pride,Returned again; and helped to make me strong;And life was very sweet for both of us.
Another, and another birth, and twiceThe little white hearse paused beside our doorAnd took away some portion of my youthWith my sweet babies. At the first you seemedTo suffer with me, standing very near;But when I wept too long, you turned away.And I was hurt, not realising thenMy grief was selfish. I could see the changeWhich motherhood and sorrow made in me;And when I saw the change that came to you,Saw how your eyes looked past me when you talked,And when I missed the love tone from your voice,I did that foolish thing weak women do,Complained and cried, accused you of neglect,And made myself obnoxious in your sight.
And often, after you had left my side,Alone I stood before my mirror, madWith anger at my pallid cheeks, my dullUnlighted eyes, my shrunken mother-breasts,And wept, and wept, and faded more and more.How could I hope to win back wandering love,And make new flames in dying embers leap,By such ungracious means?
And then She came,Firm-bosomed, round of cheek, with such young eyes,And all the ways of youth. I who had diedA thousand deaths, in waiting the returnOf that old love-look to your face once more,Died yet again and went straight into hellWhen I beheld it come at her approach.
My God, my God, how have I borne it all!Yet since she had the power to wake that look—The power to sweep the ashes from your heartOf burned-out love of me, and light new fires,One thing remained for me—to let you go.I had no wish to keep the empty frameFrom which the priceless picture had been wrenched.Nor do I blame you; it was not your fault:You gave me all that most men can give—loveOf youth, of beauty, and of passion; andI gave you full return; my womanhoodMatched well your manhood. Yet had you grown ill,Or old, and unattractive from some cause(Less close than was my service unto you),I should have clung the tighter to you, dear;And loved you, loved you, loved you more and more.
I grow so weary thinking of these things;Day in, day out; and half the awful nights.
Suddenlyand without warning they came—The Revealing Angels came.Suddenly and simultaneously, through city streets,Through quiet lanes and country roads they walked.They walked crying: ‘God has sent us to findThe vilest sinners of earth.We are to bring them before Him, before the Lord of Life.’
Their voices were like bugles;And then all war, all strife,And all the noises of the world grew still;And no one talked;And no one toiled, but many strove to flee away.Robbers and thieves, and those sunk in drunkenness and crime,Men and women of evil repute,And mothers with fatherless children in their arms, all strove to hide.But the Revealing Angels passed them by,Saying: ‘Not you, not you.Another day, when we shall come againUnto the haunts of men,Then we will call your names;But God has asked us first to bring to himThose guilty of greater shamesThan lust, or theft, or drunkenness, or vice—Yea, greater than murder done in passion,Or self-destruction done in dark despair.Now in His Holy Name we call:Come one and allCome forth; reveal your faces.’
Then through the awful silence of the world,Where noise had ceased, they came—The sinful hosts.They came from lowly and from lofty places,Some poorly clad, but many clothed like queens;They came from scenes of revel and from toil;From haunts of sin, from palaces, from homes,From boudoirs, and from churches.They came like ghosts—The vast brigades of women who had slainTheir helpless,unborn children. With them trailedLovers and husbands who had said, ‘Do this,’And those who helped for hire.They stood before the Angels—before the RevealingAngels they stood.And they heard the Angels say,And all the listening world heard the Angels say:‘These are the vilest sinners of all;For the Lord of Life made sex that birth might come;Made sex and its keen compelling desireTo fashion bodies wherein souls might goFrom lower planes to higher,Until the end is reached (which is Beginning).They have stolen the costly pleasures of the sensesAnd refused to pay God’s price.They have come together, these men and these women,As male and female they have come togetherIn the great creative act.They have invited souls, and then flung them out into space;They have made a jest of God’s design.All other sins look white beside this sinning;All other sins may be condoned, forgiven;All other sinners may be cleansed and shriven;Not these, not these.Pass on, and meet God’s eyes.’
The vast brigade moved forward, and behind then walked the Angels,Walked the sorrowful Revealing Angels.
Somany people—people—in the world;So few great souls, love ordered, well begun,In answer to the fertile mother need!So few who seemThe image of the Maker’s mortal dream;So many born of mere propinquity—Of lustful habit, or of accident.Their mothers feltNo mighty, all-compelling wish to seeTheir bosoms garden-placesAbloom with flower faces;No tidal wave swept o’er them with its flood;No thrill of flesh or heart; no leap of blood;No glowing fire, flaming to white desireFor mating and for motherhood:Yet they bore children.God! how mankind misuses Thy command,To populate the earth!How low is brought high birth!How low the woman; when, inert as spawnLeft on the sands to fertilise,She is the means through which the race goes on!Not so the first intent.Birth, as the Supreme Mind conceived it, meantThe clear imperious call of mate to mateAnd the clear answer. Only thus and thenAre fine, well-ordered, and potential livesBrought into being. Not by Church or StateCan birth be made legitimate,UnlessLove in its fulness bless.Creation so ordains its lofty lawsThat man, while greater in all other things,Is lesser in the generative cause.The father may be merely man, the male;Yet more than female must the mother be.The woman who would fashionSouls, for the use of earth and angels meet,Must entertain a high and holy passion.Not rank, or wealth, or influence of kingsCan give a soul its dowerOf majesty and power,Unless the mother bringsGreat love to that great hour.
Sisters, sisters of mine, have we done what we couldIn all the old ways, through all the new days,To better the race and to make life sweet and good?Have we played the full part that was ours in the start,Sisters of mine?
Sisters, sisters of mine, as we hurry alongTo a larger world, with our banners unfurled,The battle-cry on lips where once was Love’s old song,Are we leaving behind better things than we find,Sisters of mine?
Sisters, sisters of mine, through the march in the street,Through turmoil and din, without, and within,As we gain something big do we lose something sweet?In the growth of our might is our grace lost to sight?As new powers unfold do weloveas of old,Sisters of mine?
Owellhave we done the old tasks! in the old, old ways of earth.We have kept the house in order, we have given the children birth;And our sons went out with their fathers, and left us alone at the hearth!
We have cooked the meats for their table; we have woven their cloth at the loom;We have pulled the weeds from their gardens, and kept the flowers in bloom;And then we have sat and waited, alone in a silent room.
We have borne all the pains of travail in giving life to the race;We have toiled and saved, for the masters, and helped them to power and place;And when we asked for a pittance, they gave it with grudging grace.
On the bold, bright face of the dollar all the evils of earth are shown.We are weary of love that is barter, and of virtue that pines alone;We are out in the world with the masters: we are finding and claiming our own!
Isawthem beautiful, in fair array upon Commencement Day;Lissome and lovely, radiant and sweetAs cultured roses, brought to their estateBy careful training. Finished and complete(As teachers calculate).
They passed in maiden grace along the aisle,Leaving the chaste white sunlight of a smileUpon the gazing throng.Musing I thought upon their place as mothers of the race.
Oh there are many actors who can playGreatly, great parts; but rare indeed the soulWho can be great when cast for some small rôle;Yet that is what the world most needs; big heartsThat will shine forth and glorify poor partsIn this strange drama, Life! Do they,Who in full dress-rehearsal pass to-dayBefore admiring eyes, hold in their storeThose fine high principles which keep old EarthFrom being only earth; and make men moreThan just mere men? How will they prove their worthOf years of study? Will they walk abroadDecked with the plumage of dead bards of God,The glorious birds? And shall the lamb unbornBe slain on altars of their vanity?To some frail sister who has missed the wayWill they give Christ’s compassion, or man’s scorn;And will clean manhood, linked with honest love,The victor prove,When riches, gained by greed, dispute the claim?Will they guard well a husband’s home and name.Or lean down from their altitudes to hearThe voice of flattery speak in the earThose lying platitudes which men repeatTo listening Self-Conceit?Musing I thought upon their place as mothers of the race,As beautiful they passed in maiden grace.
Thedeepest tragedies of life are notPut into books, or acted on the stage.Nay, they are lived in silence, by tense heartsIn homes, among dull unperceiving kin,And thoughtless friends, who make a whip of wordsWherewith to lash these hearts, and call it wit.
There is a tragedy lived everywhereIn Christian lands, by an increasing hordeOf women martyrs to our social laws.Women whose hearts cry out for motherhood;Women whose bosoms ache for little heads;Women God meant for mothers, but whose livesHave been restrained, restricted, and deniedTheir natural channels, till at last they standUnmated and alone, by that sad seaWhose slow receding tide returns no more.Men meet great sorrows; but no man can graspThe depth, and height, of such a grief as this.
The call of Fatherhood is from man’s brain.Man cannot know the answer to that callSave as a woman tells him. But to herThe call of Motherhood is from the soul,The brain, the body. She is like a plantWhich buds and blossoms only to bear fruit.Man is the pollen, carried by the windOf accident, or impulse, or desire;And then his rôle of fatherhood is played.Her threefold knowledge of maternity,Through three times three great months, is hers alone.
Man as an egotist is wounded whenHe is not father. Woman when deniedThe all-embracing rôle of motherhoodRebels with her whole being. OftentimesRebellion finds its only utteranceIn shattered nerves, and lack of self-control;Which gives the merry world its chance to cry‘Old maids are queer.’In far off Eastern lands
They think of God as Mother to the race;Father and Mother of the Universe.And mayhap this is why they make their girlsWives prematurely, mothers over young,Hoping to please their Mother God this way.Since everywhere in Nature sex is shownFor procreative uses, they contendSterility is sinful. (Save when oneChooses a life of Saintship here on earth,And so conserves all forces to that end.)
Here in the West, our God is Masculine;And while we say He bade a Virgin bringHis Son to birth, we think of Him as OnePlacing false values on forced continence—Preparing heavens for those who live that life—And hells for those who stray by thought or actFrom the unnatural path our laws have made.
Mother of Christ, thou being woman, thouKnowing all depths within the woman heart,All joy, all pain, oh send the world more light.Enlarge our sympathies; and let our mindsTurn from achievements of material thingsTo contemplation of Eternal truths.Space throbs with egos, waiting for rebirth;And mother-hearted women fill the earth.Mother of Christ, show us the way to thinThe ranks of childless women, without sin.
Muchmay be done with the world we are in,Much with the race to better it;We can unfetter it,Free it from chains of the old traditions;Broaden its viewpoint of virtue and sin;Change its conditionsOf labour and wealth;And open new roadways to knowledge and health.Yet some things ever must stay as they areWhile the sea has its tide and the sky has its star.A man and a woman with love between,Loyal and tender and true and clean,Nothing better has been or can beThan just those three.
Woman may alter the first great plan.Daughters and sisters and mothersMay stalk with their brothersForth from their homes into noisy placesFit (and fit only) for masculine man.Marring their gracesWith conflict and strifeTo widen the outlook of all human life.Yet some things ever must stay as they areWhile the sea has its tide and the sky has its star.A man and a woman with love that strengthensAnd gathers new force as its earth way lengthens;Nothing better by God is givenThis side of heaven.
Science may show us a wonderful vastSecret of life and of breeding it;Man by the heeding itOut of earth’s chaos may bring a new order.Off with old systems, old laws may be cast.What now seems the borderOf licence in creeds,May then be the centre of thoughts and of deeds.Yet some things ever must stay as they areWhile the sea has its tide and the sky has its star.A man and a woman and love undefiledAnd the look of the two in the face of a child,—Oh, the joys of this world have their changing ways,But this joy stays.Nothing better on earth can beThan just those three.
Ihadbeen almost happy for an hour,Lost to the world that knew me in the parkAmong strange faces; while my little girlLeaped with the squirrels, chirruped with the birdsAnd with the sunlight glowed. She was so dear,So beautiful, so sweet; and for the timeThe rose of love, shorn of its thorn of shame,Bloomed in my heart. Then suddenly you passed.I sat alone upon the public bench;You, with your lawful husband, rode in state;And when your eyes fell on me and my child,They were not eyes, but daggers, poison tipped.
God! how good women slaughter with a look!And, like cold steel, your glance cut through my heart,Struck every petal from the rose of loveAnd left the ragged stalk alive with thorns.
My little one came running to my sideAnd called me Mother. It was like a blowBetween the eyes; and made me sick with pain.And then it seemed as if each bird and breezeTook up the word, and changed its syllablesFrom Mother into Magdalene; and criedMy shame to all the world.
It was your eyesWhich did all this. But listen now to me(Not you alone, but all the barren wivesWho, like you, flaunt their virtue in the faceOf fallen women): I do chance to knowThe crimes you think are hidden from all men(Save one who took your gold and sold his skillAnd jeopardized his name for your base ends).
I know how you have sunk your soul in senseLike any wanton; and refused to bearThe harvest of your pleasure-planted seed;I know how you have crushed the tender budWhich held a soul; how you have blighted it;And made the holy miracle of birthA wicked travesty of God’s design;Yea, many buds, which might be blossoms nowAnd beautify your selfish, arid life,Have been destroyed, because you chose to keepThe aimless freedom, and the purposeless,Self-seeking liberty of childless wives.
I was an untaught girl. By nature led,By love and passion blinded, I becameAn unwed mother. You, an honoured wife,Refuse the crown of motherhood, defyThe laws of nature, and fling baby soulsBack in the face of God. And yet you dareCall me a sinner, and yourself a saint;And all the world smiles on you, and its doorsSwing wide at your approach.I stand outside.
Surely there must be higher courts than earth,Where you and I will some day meet and beWeighed by a larger justice.
Mygrand-dame, vigorous at eighty-one,Delights in talking of her only son,My gallant father, long since dead and gone.‘Ah, but he was the lad!’She says, and sighs, and looks at me askance.How well I read the meaning of that glance—‘Poor son of such a dad;Poor weakling, dull and sad.’I could, but would not tell her bitter truthAbout my father’s youth.
She says: ‘Your father laughed his way through earth:He laughed right in the doctor’s face at birth,Such joy of life he had, such founts of mirth.Ah, what a lad was he!’And then she sighs. I feel her silent blame,Because I brought her nothing but his name.Because she does not seeHer worshipped son in me.I could, but would not, speak in my defence,Anent the difference.
She says: ‘He won all prizes in his time:He overworked, and died before his prime.At high ambition’s door I lay the crime.Ah, what a lad he was!’Well, let her rest in that deceiving thought,Of what avail to say, ‘His death was broughtBy broken sexual laws,The ancient sinful cause.’I could, but would not, tell the good old dameThe story of his shame.
I could say: ‘I am crippled, weak, and pale,Because my father was an unleashed male.Because he ran so fast, I halt and fail(Ah, yes, he was the lad),Because he drained each cup of sense-delightI must go thirsting, thirsting, day and night.Because he was joy-mad,I must be always sad.
Because he learned no law of self-control,I am a blighted soul.’Of what avail to speak and spoil her joy.Better to see her disapproving eyes,And silent, hear her say, between her sighs,‘Ah, but he was the boy!’
Shelooked at her neighbour’s house in the light of the waning day—A shower of rice on the steps, and the shreds of a bride’s bouquet.And then she drew the shade, to shut out the growing gloom,But she shut it into her heart instead. (Was that a voice in the room?)
‘My neighbour is sad,’ she sighed, ‘like the mother bird who seesThe last of her brood fly out of the nest to make its home in the trees’—And then in a passion of tears—‘But, oh, to be sad like her:Sad for a joy that has come and gone!’ (Did some one speak, or stir?)
She looked at her faded hands, all burdened with costly rings;She looked on her widowed home, all burdened with priceless things.She thought of the dead years gone, of the empty years ahead—(Yes, something stirred and something spake, and this was what it said:)
‘The voice of the Might Have Been speaks here through the lonely dusk;Life offered the fruits of love;you gathered only the husk.There are jewels ablaze on your breast where never a child has slept.’She covered her face with her ringed old hands, and wept and wept and wept.
Iwasso proud of you last night, dear girl,While man with man was striving for your smile.You never lost your head, nor once dropped downFrom your high placeAs queen in that gay whirl.
(It takes more poise to wear a little crownWith modesty and graceThan to adorn the lordlier thrones of earth.)
You seem so free from artifice and wile:And in your eyes I readEncouragement to my unspoken thought.My heart is eloquent with words to pleadIts cause of passion; but my questioning mind,Knowing how love is blind,Dwells on the pros and cons, and God knows what.
My heart cries with each beat,‘She is so beautiful, so pure, so sweet,So more than dear.’And then I hearThe voice of Reason, asking: ‘Would she meetLife’s common duties with good common sense?Could she bear quiet evenings at your hearth,And not be sighing for gay scenes of mirth?If, some great day, love’s mighty recompenseFor chastity surrendered came to her,If she felt stirBeneath her heart a little pulse of life,Would she rejoice with holy pride and wonder,And find new glory in the name of wife?Or would she plot with sin, and seek to plunderLove’s sanctuary, and cast away its treasure,That she might keep her freedom and her pleasure?Could she be loyal mate and mother dutiful?Or is she only some bright hothouse bloom,Seedless and beautiful,Meant just for decoration, and for show?’Alone here in my room,I hear this voice of Reason. My poor heartHas ever but one answer to impart,‘I love her so.’
After the ball last night, when I came homeI stood before my mirror, and took noteOf all that men call beautiful. Delight,Keen sweet delight, possessed me, when I sawMy own reflection smiling on me there,Because your eyes, through all the swirling hours,And in your slow good-night, had made a factOf what before I fancied might be so;Yet knowing how men lie, by look and act,I still had doubted. But I doubt no more,I know you love me, love me. And I feelYour satisfaction in my comeliness.
Beauty and youth, good health and willing mind,A spotless reputation, and a heartLonging for mating and for motherhood,And lips unsullied by another’s kiss—These are the riches I can bring to you.
But as I sit here, thinking of it allIn the clear light of morning, sudden fearHas seized upon me. What has been your past?From out the jungle of old reckless years,May serpents crawl across our path some dayAnd pierce us with their fangs? Oh, I am notA prude or bigot; and I have not livedA score and three full years in ignoranceOf human nature. Much I can condone;For well I know our kinship to the earthAnd all created things. Why, even IHave felt the burden of virginity,When flowers and birds and golden butterfliesIn early spring were mating; and I knowHow loud that call of sex must sound to manAbove the feeble protest of the world.But I can hear from depths within my soulThe voices of my unborn children cryFor rightful heritage. (May God attuneThe souls of men, that they may hear and heedThat plaintive voice above the call of sex;And may the world’s weak protest swell intoA thunderous diapason—a demandFor cleaner fatherhood.)Oh, love, come near;Look in my eyes, and say I need not fear.
Bristlingwith steeples, high against the hill,Like some great thistle in the rosy dawnIt stood; the Town-of-Christian-Churches, stood.The Traveller surveyed it with a smile.‘Surely,’ He said, ‘here is the home of peace;Here neighbour lives with neighbour in accord;God in the heart of all. Else why these spires?’(Christmas season, and every bell ringing.)
The sudden shriek of whistles changed the soundFrom mellow music into jarring noise.Then down the street pale hurrying children came,And vanished in the yawning Factory door.He called to them: ‘Come back, come unto Me.’The Foreman cursed, and caned Him from the place.(Christmas season, and every bell ringing.)
Forth from two churches came two men, and met,Disputing loudly over boundary lines,Hate in their eyes, and murder in their hearts.A haughty woman drew her skirts asideBecause her fallen sister passed that way.The Traveller rebuked them all. Amazed,They asked in indignation, ‘Who are you,Daring to interfere in private lives?’The Traveller replied, ‘My name is CHRIST.’(Christmas season, and every bell ringing.)
Whathave you done, and what are you doing with life, O Man!O Average Man of the world—Average Man of the Christian world we call civilised?What have you done to pay for the labour pains of the mother who bore you?On earth you occupy space; you consume oxygen from the air:And what do you give in return for these things?Who is better that you live, and strive, and toil?Or that you live through the toiling and striving of others?As you pass down the street does any one look on you and say,‘There goes a good son, a true husband, a wise father, a fine citizen?A man whose strong hand is ready to help a neighbour,A man to trust’? And what do women say of you?Unto their own souls what do women say?Do they say: ‘He helped to make the road easier for tired feet?To broaden the narrow horizon for aching eyes?He helped us to higher ideals of womanhood’?Look into your own heart and answer, O Average Man of the world,Of the Christian world we call civilised.
What do men think of you, what do they think and say of you,O Average Woman of the world?Do they say: ‘There is a woman with a great heart,Loyal to her sex, and above envy and evil speaking?There is a daughter, wife, mother, with a purpose in life:She can be trusted to mould the minds of little children.She knows how to be good without being dull;How to be glad and to make others glad without descending to folly;She is one who illuminates the path wherein she walks;One who awakens the best in every human being she meets’?Look into your heart, O Woman! and answer this:What are you doing with the beautiful years?Is your to-day a better thing than was your yesterday?Have you grown in knowledge, grace, and usefulness?Or are you ravelling out the wonderful fabric knit by Time,And throwing away the threads?Make answer, O Woman! Average Woman of the Christian world.