Thou wilt not sentence to eternal lifeMy soul that prays that it may sleep and sleepLike a white statue dropped into the deep,Covered with sand, covered with chests of gold,And slave-bones, tossed from many a pirate hold.But for this prayer thou wilt not bind in HellMy soul, that shook with love for Fame and Truth—In such unquenched desires consumed his youth—Let me turn dust, like dead leaves in the Fall,Or wood that lights an hour your knightly hall—Amen.
IThe Hope of the Resurrection
Though I have watched so many mourners weepO'er the real dead, in dull earth laid asleep—Those dead seemed but the shadows of my daysThat passed and left me in the sun's bright rays.Now though you go on smiling in the sunOur love is slain, and love and you were one.You are the first, you I have known so long,Whose death was deadly, a tremendous wrong.Therefore I seek the faith that sets it rightAmid the lilies and the candle-light.I think on Heaven, for in that air so clearWe two may meet, confused and parted here.Ah, when man's dearest dies, 'tis then he goesTo that old balm that heals the centuries' woes.Then Christ's wild cry in all the streets is rife:—"I am the Resurrection and the Life."
IIWe meet at the Judgment and I fear it Not
Though better men may fear that trumpet's warning,I meet you, lady, on the Judgment morning,With golden hope my spirit still adorning.Our God who made you all so fair and sweetIs three times gentle, and before his feetRejoicing I shall say:—"The girl you gaveWas my first Heaven, an angel bent to save.Oh, God, her maker, if my ingrate breathIs worth this rescue from the Second Death,Perhaps her dear proud eyes grow gentler tooThat scorned my graceless years and trophies few.Gone are those years, and gone ill-deeds that turnedHer sacred beauty from my songs that burned.We now as comrades through the stars may takeThe rich and arduous quests I did forsake.Grant me a seraph-guide to thread the throngAnd quickly find that woman-soul so strong.I dream that in her deeply-hidden heartHurt love lived on, though we were far apart,A brooding secret mercy like your ownThat blooms to-day to vindicate your throne.
(To a Man who maintained that the Mausoleum is the Stateliest Possible Manner of Interment)
I would be one with the dark, dark earth:—Follow the plough with a yokel tread.I would be part of the Indian corn,Walking the rows with the plumes o'erhead.I would be one with the lavish earth,Eating the bee-stung apples red:Walking where lambs walk on the hills;By oak-grove paths to the pools be led.I would be one with the dark-bright nightWhen sparkling skies and the lightning wed—Walking on with the vicious windBy roads whence even the dogs have fled.I would be one with the sacred earthOn to the end, till I sleep with the dead.Terror shall put no spears through me.Peace shall jewel my shroud instead.I shall be one with all pit-black thingsFinding their lowering threat unsaid:Stars for my pillow there in the gloom,—Oak-roots arching about my head!Stars, like daisies, shall rise through the earth,Acorns fall round my breast that bled.Children shall weave there a flowery chain,Squirrels on acorn-hearts be fed:—Fruit of the traveller-heart of me,Fruit of my harvest-songs long sped:Sweet with the life of my sunburned daysWhen the sheaves were ripe, and the apples red.
The North Star whispers: "You are oneOf those whose course no chance can change.You blunder, but are not undone,Your spirit-task is fixed and strange."When here you walk, a bloodless shade,A singer all men else forget.Your chants of hammer, forge and spadeWill move the prairie-village yet."That young, stiff-necked, reviling townBeholds your fancies on her walls,And paints them out or tears them down,Or bars them from her feasting-halls."Yet shall the fragments still remain;Yet shall remain some watch-tower strongThat ivy-vines will not disdain,Haunted and trembling with your song."Your flambeau in the dusk shall burn,Flame high in storms, flame white and clear;Your ghost in gleaming robes returnAnd burn a deathless incense here."
This section is a Christmas tree:Loaded with pretty toys for you.Behold the blocks, the Noah's arks,The popguns painted red and blue.No solemn pine-cone forest-fruit,But silver horns and candy sacksAnd many little tinsel heartsAnd cherubs pink, and jumping-jacks.For every child a gift, I hope.The doll upon the topmost boughIs mine. But all the rest are yours.And I will light the candles now.
"The sun says his prayers," said the fairy,Or else he would wither and die."The sun says his prayers," said the fairy,"For strength to climb up through the sky.He leans on invisible angels,And Faith is his prop and his rod.The sky is his crystal cathedral.And dawn is his altar to God."
I. The Lion
The Lion is a kingly beast.He likes a Hindu for a feast.And if no Hindu he can get,The lion-family is upset.He cuffs his wife and bites her earsTill she is nearly moved to tears.Then some explorer finds the denAnd all is family peace again.
II. An Explanation of the Grasshopper
The Grasshopper, the grasshopper,I will explain to you:—He is the Brownies' racehorse,The fairies' Kangaroo.
III. The Dangerous Little Boy Fairies
In fairyland the little boysWould rather fight than eat their meals.They like to chase a gauze-winged flyAnd catch and beat him till he squeals.Sometimes they come to sleeping menArmed with the deadly red-rose thorn,And those that feel its fearful woundRepent the day that they were born.
IV. The Mouse that gnawed the Oak-tree Down
The mouse that gnawed the oak-tree downBegan his task in early life.He kept so busy with his teethHe had no time to take a wife.He gnawed and gnawed through sun and rainWhen the ambitious fit was on,Then rested in the sawdust tillA month of idleness had gone.He did not move about to huntThe coteries of mousie-men.He was a snail-paced, stupid thingUntil he cared to gnaw again.The mouse that gnawed the oak-tree down,When that tough foe was at his feet—Found in the stump no angel-cakeNor buttered bread, nor cheese, nor meat—The forest-roof let in the sky."This light is worth the work," said he."I'll make this ancient swamp more light,"And started on another tree.
V. Parvenu
Where does Cinderella sleep?By far-off day-dream river.A secret place her burning PrinceDecks, while his heart-strings quiver.Homesick for our cinder world,Her low-born shoulders shiver;She longs for sleep in cinders curled—We, for the day-dream river.
VI. The Spider and the Ghost of the Fly
Once I loved a spiderWhen I was born a fly,A velvet-footed spiderWith a gown of rainbow-dye.She ate my wings and gloated.She bound me with a hair.She drove me to her parlorAbove her winding stair.To educate young spidersShe took me all apart.My ghost came back to haunt her.I saw her eat my heart.
VII. Crickets on a Strike
The foolish queen of fairylandFrom her milk-white throne in a lily-bell,Gave command to her cricket-bandTo play for her when the dew-drops fell.But the cold dew spoiled their instrumentsAnd they play for the foolish queen no more.Instead those sturdy malcontentsPlay sharps and flats in my kitchen floor.
(Being a reminiscence of certain private theatricals.)
Oh, cabaret dancer,Iknow a dancer,Whose eyes have not looked on the feasts that are vain.Iknow a dancer,Iknow a dancer,Whose soul has no bond with the beasts of the plain:Judith the dancer, Judith the dancer,With foot like the snow, and with step like the rain.Oh, thrice-painted dancer, vaudeville dancer,Sad in your spangles, with soul all astrain,Iknow a dancer,Iknow a dancer,Whose laughter and weeping are spiritual gain,A pure-hearted, high-hearted maiden evangel,With strength the dark cynical earth to disdain.Flowers of bright Broadway, you of the chorus,Who sing in the hope of forgetting your pain:I turn to a sister of Sainted Cecilia,A white bird escaping the earth's tangled skein:—The music of God is her innermost brooding,The whispering angels her footsteps sustain.Oh, proud Russian dancer: praise for your dancing.No clean human passion my rhyme would arraign.You dance for Apollo with noble devotion,A high cleansing revel to make the heart sane.But Judith the dancer prays to a spiritMore white than Apollo and all of his train.I know a dancer who finds the true Godhead,Who bends o'er a brazier in Heaven's clear plain.I know a dancer, I know a dancer,Who lifts us toward peace, from this earth that is vain:Judith the dancer, Judith the dancer,With foot like the snow, and with step like the rain.
After having read a Great Deal of Good Current Poetry in the Magazines and Newspapers
Ah, they are passing, passing by,Wonderful songs, but born to die!Cries from the infinite human seas,Waves thrice-winged with harmonies.Here I stand on a pier in the foamSeeing the songs to the beach go home,Dying in sand while the tide flows back,As it flowed of old in its fated track.Oh, hurrying tide that will not hearYour own foam-children dying near:Is there no refuge-house of song,No home, no haven where songs belong?Oh, precious hymns that come and go!You perish, and I love you so!
Factory windows are always broken.Somebody's always throwing bricks,Somebody's always heaving cinders,Playing ugly Yahoo tricks.Factory windows are always broken.Other windows are let alone.No one throws through the chapel-windowThe bitter, snarling, derisive stone.Factory windows are always broken.Something or other is going wrong.Something is rotten—I think, in Denmark.End of the factory-window song.
Moving-picture Actress
(On hearing she was leaving the moving-pictures for the stage.)
Mary Pickford, doll divine,Year by year, and every dayAt the moving-picture play,You have been my valentine.Once a free-limbed page in hose,Baby-Rosalind in flower,Cloakless, shrinking, in that hourHow our reverent passion rose,How our fine desire you won.Kitchen-wench another day,Shapeless, wooden every way.Next, a fairy from the sun.Once you walked a grown-up strandFish-wife siren, full of lure,Snaring with devices sureLads who murdered on the sand.But on most days just a childDimpled as no grown-folk are,Cold of kiss as some north star,Violet from the valleys wild.Snared as innocence must be,Fleeing, prisoned, chained, half-dead—At the end of tortures dreadRoaring cowboys set you free.Fly, O song, to her to-day,Like a cowboy cross the land.Snatch her from Belasco's handAnd that prison called Broadway.All the village swains awaitOne dear lily-girl demure,Saucy, dancing, cold and pure,Elf who must return in state.
Moving-picture Actress
(After seeing the reel called "Oil and Water".)
Beauty has a throne-roomIn our humorous town,Spoiling its hob-goblins,Laughing shadows down.Rank musicians tortureRagtime ballads vile,But we walk serenelyDown the odorous aisle.We forgive the squalorAnd the boom and squealFor the Great Queen flashesFrom the moving reel.Just a prim blonde strangerIn her early day,Hiding brilliant weapons,Too averse to play,Then she burst upon usDancing through the night.Oh, her maiden radiance,Veils and roses white.With new powers, yet cautious,Not too smart or skilled,That first flash of dancingWrought the thing she willed:—Mobs of us made nobleBy her strong desire,By her white, uplifting,Royal romance-fire.Though the tin pianoSnarls its tango rude,Though the chairs are shakyAnd the dramas crude,Solemn are her motions,Stately are her wiles,Filling oafs with wisdom,Saving souls with smiles;'Mid the restless actorsShe is rich and slow.She will stand like marble,She will pause and glow,Though the film is twitching,Keep a peaceful reign,Ruler of her passion,Ruler of our pain!
The sun gives not directlyThe coal, the diamond crown;Not in a special basketAre these from Heaven let down.The sun gives not directlyThe plough, man's iron friend;Not by a path or stairwayDo tools from Heaven descend.Yet sunshine fashions all thingsThat cut or burn or fly;And corn that seems upon the earthIs made in the hot sky.The gravel of the roadbed,The metal of the gun,The engine of the airshipTrace somehow from the sun.And so your soul, my lady—(Mere sunshine, nothing more)—Prepares me the contraptionsI work with or adore.Within me cornfields rustle,Niagaras roar their way,Vast thunderstorms and rainbowsAre in my thought to-day.Ten thousand anvils sound thereBy forges flaming white,And many books I read there,And many books I write;And freedom's bells are ringing,And bird-choirs chant and fly—The whole world works in me to-dayAnd all the shining sky,Because of one small ladyWhose smile is my chief sun.She gives not any gift to meYet all gifts, giving one....Amen.
Sometimes I dip my pen and find the bottle full of fire,The salamanders flying forth I cannot but admire.It's Etna, or Vesuvius, if those big things were small,And then 'tis but itself again, and does not smoke at all.And so my blood grows cold. I say, "The bottle held but ink,And, if you thought it otherwise, the worser for your think."And then, just as I throw my scribbled paper on the floor,The bottle says, "Fe, fi, fo, fum," and steams and shouts some more.O sad deceiving ink, as bad as liquor in its way—All demons of a bottle size have pranced from you to-day,And seized my pen for hobby-horse as witches ride a broom,And left a trail of brimstone words and blots and gobs of gloom.And yet when I am extra good and say my prayers at night,And mind my ma, and do the chores, and speak to folks polite,My bottle spreads a rainbow-mist, and from the vapor fineTen thousand troops from fairyland come riding in a line.I've seen them on their chargers race around my study chair,They opened wide the window and rode forth upon the air.The army widened as it went, and into myriads grew,O how the lances shimmered, how the silvery trumpets blew!
He paid a Swede twelve bits an hourJust to invent a fancy styleTo spread the celebration paintSo it would show at least a mile.Some things they did I will not tell.They're not quite proper for a rhyme.But I WILL say Yim Yonson SwedeDid sure invent a sunflower time.One thing they did that I can tellAnd not offend the ladies here:—They took a goat to Simp's SaloonAnd made it take a bath in beer.That ENTERprise took MANagement.They broke a wash-tub in the fray.But mister goat was bathed all rightAnd bar-keep Simp was, too, they say.They wore girls' pink straw hats to churchAnd clucked like hens. They surely did.They bought two HOtel frying pansAnd in them down the mountain slid.They went to Denver in good clothes,And kept Burt's grill-room wide awake,And cut about like jumping-jacks,And ordered seven-dollar steak.They had the waiters whirling roundJust sweeping up the smear and smash.They tried to buy the State-house flag.They showed the Janitor the cash.And old Dan Tucker on a toot,Or John Paul Jones before the breeze,Or Indians eating fat fried dog,Were not as happy babes as these.One morn, in hills near Cripple-creekWith cheerful swears the two awoke.The Swede had twenty cents, all right.But Gassy Thompson was clean broke.
I. The Doll upon the Topmost Bough
This doll upon the topmost bough,This playmate-gift, in Christmas dress,Was taken down and brought to meOne sleety night most comfortless.Her hair was gold, her dolly-sashWas gray brocade, most good to see.The dear toy laughed, and I forgotThe ill the new year promised me.
II. On Suddenly Receiving a Curl Long Refused
Oh, saucy gold circle of fairyland silk—Impudent, intimate, delicate treasure:A noose for my heart and a ring for my finger:—Here in my study you sing me a measure.Whimsy and song in my little gray study!Words out of wonderland, praising her fineness,Touched with her pulsating, delicate laughter,Saying, "The girl is all daring and kindness!"Saying, "Her soul is all feminine gameness,Trusting her insights, ardent for living;She would be weeping with me and be laughing,A thoroughbred, joyous receiving and giving!"
III. On Receiving One of Gloriana's Letters
Your pen needs but a ruffleTo be Pavlova whirling.It surely is a scalawagA-scamping down the page.A pretty little May-windThe morning buds uncurling.And then the white sweet Russian,The dancer of the age.Your pen's the Queen of Sheba,Such serious questions bringing,That merry rascal SolomonWould show a sober face:—And then again PavlovaTo set our spirits singing,The snowy-swan bacchanteAll glamour, glee and grace.
IV. In Praise of Gloriana's Remarkable Golden Hair
The gleaming head of one fine friendIs bent above my little song,So through the treasure-pits of HeavenIn fancy's shoes, I march along.I wander, seek and peer and ponderIn Splendor's last ensnaring lair—'Mid burnished harps and burnished crownsWhere noble chariots gleam and flare:Amid the spirit-coins and gems,The plates and cups and helms of fire—The gorgeous-treasure-pits of Heaven—Where angel-misers slake desire!O endless treasure-pits of goldWhere silly angel-men make mirth—I think that I am there this hour,Though walking in the ways of earth!
Girl with the burning golden eyes,And red-bird song, and snowy throat:I bring you gold and silver moonsAnd diamond stars, and mists that float.I bring you moons and snowy clouds,I bring you prairie skies to-nightTo feebly praise your golden eyesAnd red-bird song, and throat so white.
I. Euclid
Old Euclid drew a circleOn a sand-beach long ago.He bounded and enclosed itWith angles thus and so.His set of solemn greybeardsNodded and argued muchOf arc and of circumference,Diameter and such.A silent child stood by themFrom morning until noonBecause they drew such charmingRound pictures of the moon.
II. The Haughty Snail-king(What Uncle William told the Children)
Twelve snails went walking after night.They'd creep an inch or so,Then stop and bug their eyesAnd blow.Some folks... are... deadly... slow.Twelve snails went walking yestereve,Led by their fat old king.They were so dull their princeling hadNo sceptre, robe or ring—Only a paper cap to wearWhen nightly journeying.This king-snail said: "I feel a thoughtWithin.... It blossoms soon....O little courtiers of mine,...I crave a pretty boon....Oh, yes... (High thoughts with effort comeAnd well-bred snails are ALMOST dumb.)"I wish I had a yellow crownAs glistering... as... the moon."
III. What the Rattlesnake Said
The moon's a little prairie-dog.He shivers through the night.He sits upon his hill and criesFor fear thatIwill bite.The sun's a broncho. He's afraidLike every other thing,And trembles, morning, noon and night,LestIshould spring, and sting.
IV. The Moon's the North Wind's Cooky(What the Little Girl Said)
The Moon's the North Wind's cooky.He bites it, day by day,Until there's but a rim of scrapsThat crumble all away.The South Wind is a baker.He kneads clouds in his den,And bakes a crisp new moonthat... greedyNorth... Wind... eats... again!
V. Drying their Wings(What the Carpenter Said)
The moon's a cottage with a door.Some folks can see it plain.Look, you may catch a glint of light,A sparkle through the pane,Showing the place is brighter stillWithin, though bright without.There, at a cosy open fireStrange babes are grouped about.The children of the wind and tide—The urchins of the sky,Drying their wings from storms and thingsSo they again can fly.
VI. What the Gray-winged Fairy Said
The moon's a gong, hung in the wild,Whose song the fays hold dear.Of course you do not hear it, child.It takes a FAIRY ear.The full moon is a splendid gongThat beats as night grows still.It sounds above the evening songOf dove or whippoorwill.
VII. Yet Gentle will the Griffin Be(What Grandpa told the Children)
The moon? It is a griffin's egg,Hatching to-morrow night.And how the little boys will watchWith shouting and delightTo see him break the shell and stretchAnd creep across the sky.The boys will laugh. The little girls,I fear, may hide and cry.Yet gentle will the griffin be,Most decorous and fat,And walk up to the milky wayAnd lap it like a cat.
I. Prologue. A Sense of Humor
No man should stand before the moonTo make sweet song thereon,With dandified importance,His sense of humor gone.Nay, let us don the motley cap,The jester's chastened mien,If we would woo that looking-glassAnd see what should be seen.O mirror on fair Heaven's wall,We find there what we bring.So, let us smile in honest partAnd deck our souls and sing.Yea, by the chastened jest aloneWill ghosts and terrors pass,And fays, or suchlike friendly things,Throw kisses through the glass.
II. On the Garden-wall
Oh, once I walked a gardenIn dreams. 'Twas yellow grass.And many orange-trees grew thereIn sand as white as glass.The curving, wide wall-borderWas marble, like the snow.I walked that wall a fairy-princeAnd, pacing quaint and slow,Beside me were my pages,Two giant, friendly birds.Half-swan they were, half peacock.They spake in courtier-words.Their inner wings a chariot,Their outer wings for flight,They lifted me from dreamland.We bade those trees good-night.Swiftly above the stars we rode.I looked below me soon.The white-walled garden I had ruledWas one lone flower—the moon.
III. Written for a Musician
Hungry for music with a desperate hungerI prowled abroad, I threaded through the town;The evening crowd was clamoring and drinking,Vulgar and pitiful—my heart bowed down—Till I remembered duller hours made nobleBy strangers clad in some surprising grace.Wait, wait, my soul, your music comes ere midnightAppearing in some unexpected placeWith quivering lips, and gleaming, moonlit face.
IV. The Moon is a Painter
He coveted her portrait.He toiled as she grew gay.She loved to see him laborIn that devoted way.And in the end it pleased her,But bowed him more with care.Her rose-smile showed so plainly,Her soul-smile was not there.That night he groped without a lampTo find a cloak, a book,And on the vexing portraitBy moonrise chanced to look.The color-scheme was out of key,The maiden rose-smile faint,But through the blessed darknessShe gleamed, his friendly saint.The comrade, white, immortal,His bride, and more than bride—The citizen, the sage of mind,For whom he lived and died.
V. The Encyclopaedia
"If I could set the moon uponThis table," said my friend,"Among the standard poetsAnd brochures without end,And noble prints of old Japan,How empty they would seem,By that encyclopaediaOf whim and glittering dream."
VI. What the Miner in the Desert Said
The moon's a brass-hooped water-keg,A wondrous water-feast.If I could climb the ridge and drinkAnd give drink to my beast;If I could drain that keg, the fliesWould not be biting so,My burning feet be spry again,My mule no longer slow.And I could rise and dig for ore,And reach my fatherland,And not be food for ants and hawksAnd perish in the sand.
VII. What the Coal-heaver Said
The moon's an open furnace doorWhere all can see the blast,We shovel in our blackest griefs,Upon that grate are castOur aching burdens, loves and fearsAnd underneath them waitPaper and tar and pitch and pineCalled strife and blood and hate.Out of it all there comes a flame,A splendid widening light.Sorrow is turned to mysteryAnd Death into delight.
VIII. What the Moon Saw
Two statesmen met by moonlight.Their ease was partly feigned.They glanced about the prairie.Their faces were constrained.In various ways aforetimeThey had misled the state,Yet did it so politelyTheir henchmen thought them great.They sat beneath a hedge and spakeNo word, but had a smoke.A satchel passed from hand to hand.Next day, the deadlock broke.
IX. What Semiramis Said
The moon's a steaming chaliceOf honey and venom-wine.A little of it sipped by nightMakes the long hours divine.But oh, my reckless lovers,They drain the cup and wail,Die at my feet with shaking limbsAnd tender lips all pale.Above them in the sky it bendsEmpty and gray and dread.To-morrow night 'tis full again,Golden, and foaming red.
X. What the Ghost of the Gambler Said
Where now the huts are empty,Where never a camp-fire glows,In an abandoned canyon,A Gambler's Ghost arose.He muttered there, "The moon's a sackOf dust." His voice rose thin:"I wish I knew the miner-man.I'd play, and play to win.In every game in Cripple-creekOf old, when stakes were high,I held my own. Now I would playFor that sack in the sky.The sport would not be ended there.'Twould rather be begun.I'd bet my moon against his stars,And gamble for the sun."
XI. The Spice-tree
This is the songThe spice-tree sings:"Hunger and fire,Hunger and fire,Sky-born Beauty—Spice of desire,"Under the spice-treeWatch and wait,Burning maidensAnd lads that mate.The spice-tree spreadsAnd its boughs come downShadowing village and farm and town.And none can seeBut the pure of heartThe great green leavesAnd the boughs descending,And hear the song that is never ending.The deep roots whisper,The branches say:—"Love to-morrow,And love to-day,And till Heaven's day,And till Heaven's day."The moon is a bird's nest in its branches,The moon is hung in its topmost spaces.And there, to-night, two doves play houseWhile lovers watch with uplifted faces.Two doves go homeTo their nest, the moon.It is woven of twigs of broken light,With threads of scarlet and threads of grayAnd a lining of down for silk delight.To their Eden, the moon, fly home our doves,Up through the boughs of the great spice-tree;—And one is the kiss I took from you,And one is the kiss you gave to me.
XII. The Scissors-grinder(What the Tramp Said)
The old man had his box and wheelFor grinding knives and shears.No doubt his bell in village streetsWas joy to children's ears.And I bethought me of my youthWhen such men came around,And times I asked them in, quite sureThe scissors should be ground.The old man turned and spoke to me,His face at last in view.And then I thought those curious eyesWere eyes that once I knew."The moon is but an emery-wheelTo whet the sword of God,"He said. "And here beside my fireI stretch upon the sodEach night, and dream, and watch the starsAnd watch the ghost-clouds go.And see that sword of God in HeavenA-waving to and fro.I see that sword each century, friend.It means the world-war comesWith all its bloody, wicked chiefsAnd hate-inflaming drums.Men talk of peace, but I have seenThat emery-wheel turn round.The voice of Abel cries againTo God from out the ground.The ditches must flow red, the plagueGo stark and screaming byEach time that sword of God takes edgeWithin the midnight sky.And those that scorned their brothers hereAnd sowed a wind of shameWill reap the whirlwind as of oldAnd face relentless flame."And thus the scissors-grinder spoke,His face at last in view.And there beside the railroad bridgeI saw the wandering Jew.
XIII. My Lady in her White Silk Shawl
My lady in her white silk shawlIs like a lily dim,Within the twilight of the roomEnthroned and kind and prim.My lady! Pale gold is her hair.Until she smiles her faceIs pale with far Hellenic moods,With thoughts that find no placeIn our harsh village of the WestWherein she lives of late,She's distant as far-hidden stars,And cold—(almost!)—as fate.But when she smiles she's here againRosy with comrade-cheer,A Puritan Bacchante madeTo laugh around the year.The merry gentle moon herself,Heart-stirring too, like her,Wakening wild and innocent loveIn every worshipper.
XIV. Aladdin and the Jinn
"Bring me soft song," said Aladdin."This tailor-shop sings not at all.Chant me a word of the twilight,Of roses that mourn in the fall.Bring me a song like hashishThat will comfort the stale and the sad,For I would be mending my spirit,Forgetting these days that are bad,Forgetting companions too shallow,Their quarrels and arguments thin,Forgetting the shouting Muezzin:"—"I AM YOUR SLAVE," said the Jinn."Bring me old wines," said Aladdin."I have been a starved pauper too long.Serve them in vessels of jade and of shell,Serve them with fruit and with song:—Wines of pre-Adamite SultansDigged from beneath the black seas:—New-gathered dew from the heavensDripped down from Heaven's sweet trees,Cups from the angels' pale tablesThat will make me both handsome and wise,For I have beheld her, the princess,Firelight and starlight her eyes.Pauper I am, I would woo her.And—let me drink wine, to begin,Though the Koran expressly forbids it.""I AM YOUR SLAVE," said the Jinn."Plan me a dome," said Aladdin,"That is drawn like the dawn of the MOON,When the sphere seems to rest on the mountains,Half-hidden, yet full-risen soon.""Build me a dome," said Aladdin,"That shall cause all young lovers to sigh,The fullness of life and of beauty,Peace beyond peace to the eye—A palace of foam and of opal,Pure moonlight without and within,Where I may enthrone my sweet lady.""I AM YOUR SLAVE," said the Jinn.