IN THE FOREST

The deep seclusion of this forest path,—O’er which the green boughs weave a canopy;Along which bluet and anemoneSpread a dim carpet; where the Twilight hathHer dark abode; and, sweet as aftermath,Wood-fragrance roams,—has so enchanted me,That yonder blossoming bramble seems to beSome Sylvan resting, rosy from her bath:Has so enspelled me with tradition’s dreams,That every foam-white stream that, twinkling, flows,And every bird that flutters wings of tan,Or warbles hidden, to my fancy seemsA Naiad dancing to a Faun who blowsWild woodland music on the pipes of Pan.

One well might deem, among these miles of woods,Such were the Forests of the Holy Grail,—Brocéliand and Dean: where, clothed in mail,The Knights of Arthur rode, and all the broodsOf legend laired.—And, where no sound intrudesUpon the ear, except the glimmering wailOf some far bird; or, in some flowery swale,A brook that murmurs to the solitudes,Might think he hears the laugh of VivienBlent with the moan of Merlin, muttering boundBy his own magic to one stony spot:And, in the cloud that looms above the glen,—In which the sun burns like the Table Round,—Might dream he sees the towers of Camelot.

Meseemed that while she played, while lightly yetHer fingers fell, as roses bloom by bloom,I listened—dead within a mighty roomOf some old palace where great casements letGaunt moonlight in, that glimpsed a parapetOf statued marble: in the arrased gloomMajestic pictures towered, dim as doom,The dreams of Titian and of Tintoret.And then, it seemed, along a corridor,A mile of oak, a stricken footstep came,Hurrying, yet slow.... I thought long centuriesPassed ere she entered—she, I loved of yore,For whom I died, who wildly wailed my nameAnd bent and kissed me on the mouth and eyes.

Onward he gallops through enchanted gloom.—The phantoms of the forest, dark and dim,And shadows of vast death environ him—Onward he spurs victorious over doom.Before his eyes that love’s far fires illume—Where courage sits, impregnable and grim—The form and features ofherbeauty swim,Beckoning him on with looks that fears consume.The thought of her distress, her lips to kiss,Mails him in triple might; and so at lastTo Lust’s huge keep he comes; its giant wall,Wild-towering, frowning from the precipice:And through its gate, borne like a bugle-blast,O’er night and hell he thunders to his all.

In story books, when I was very young,I knew her first, one of the Fairy Race;And then it was her picture took its place,Framed round with love’s deep gold, and draped and hungHigh in my heart’s red room: no song was sung,No tale of passion told, I did not graceWith her associated form and face,And intimated charm of touch and tongue.As years went on she grew to more and more,Until each thing, symbolic to my heartOf beauty,—such as honor, truth, and fame,—Within the studio of my soul’s thought woreHer lineaments, whom I, with all my art,Strove to embody and to give a name.

Out of the past the dim leaves spake to meThe thoughts of Pindar with a voice so sweetHyblæan bees seemed swarming my retreatAround the reedy well of Poesy.I closed the book. Then, knee to neighbor knee,Sat with the soul of Plato, to repeatDoctrines, till mine seemed some Socratic seatHigh on the summit of Philosophy.Around the wave of one Religion taughtHer first rude children. From the stars that burnedAbove the mountained ether, Science learnedThe first vague lessons of the work she wrought.Daughters of God, in whom we still beholdThe Age of Iron and the Age of Gold.

It is as if imperial trumpets brokeAgain the silence on War’s iron height;And Cæsar’s armored legions marched to fight,While Rome, blood-red upon her mountain-yoke,Blazed like an awful sunset. At a stroke,Again I see the living torches lightThe horrible revels, and the bloated, white,Bayed brow of Nero smiling through the smoke:And here and there a little band of slavesAmong dark ruins; and the form of Paul,Bearded and gaunt, expounding still the Word:And towards the North the tottering architravesOf empire; and, wild-waving over all,The flaming figure of a Gothic sword.

R. H. S.

Song hath a catalogue of lovely thingsThy kind hath oft defiled,—whose spite misleadsThe world too often!—where the poet reads,As in a fable, of old envyings,Crows, such as thou, which hush the bird that sings,Or kill it with their cawings: thorns and weeds,Such as thyself, ’midst which the wind sows seedsOf flow’rs, these crush before one blossom swings.But here and there the wisdom of a SchoolUnknown to these hath often written down“Fame” in white ink the future hath turned brown;When every beauty, heaped with ridicule,In their ignoble prose, proved their renown,Making each famous—as an ass or fool.

Who hath beheld the goddess face to face,Blind with her beauty, all his days shall goClimbing lone mountains towards her temple’s place,Weighed with Song’s sweet, inexorable woe.

Each form of beauty’s but the new disguiseOf thoughts more beautiful than forms can be;Sceptics, who search with unanointed eyes,Never the Earth’s wild Fairy-dance shall see.

God-born before the Sons of God, she hurled,With awful symphonies of flood and fire,God’s name on rocking chaos—world by worldFlamed as the universe rolled from her lyre.

They come as couriers of Heaven: their feetSonorous-sandaled with majestic awe;In raiment of swift foam and wind and heat,Blowing the trumpets of God’s wrath and law.

Above the Circus of the World she sat,Beautiful and base, a harlot crowned with pride:Fierce Nations, upon whom she sneered and spat,Shrieked at her feet and for her pastime died.

Down all the lanterned Bagdad of our youthHe steals, with golden justice for the poor:Within his palace—you shall know the truth!—A blood-smeared headsman hides behind each door.

In classic beauty, cold, immaculate,A voiceful sculpture, stern and still she stands,Upon her brow deep-chiselled love and hate,That sorrow o’er dead roses in her hands.

High as a star, yet lowly as a flower,Unknown she takes her unassuming placeAt Earth’s proud masquerade—the appointed hourStrikes, and, behold! the marvel of her face.

These—the bright symbols of man’s hope and fame,In which he reads his blessing or his curse—Are syllables with which God speaks His nameIn the vast utterance of the universe.

Dweller in hollow places, hills and rocks,Daughter of Silence and old Solitude,Tip-toe she stands within her cave or wood,Her only life the noises that she mocks.

Even as a child he loved to thrid the bowers,And mark the loafing sunlight’s lazy laugh;Or, on each season, spell the epitaphOf its dead months repeated in their flowers;Or list the music of the strolling showers,Whose vagabond notes strummed through a twinkling staff,Or read the day’s delivered monographThrough all the chapters of its dædal hours.Still with the same child-faith and child regardHe looks on Nature, hearing, at her heart,The Beautiful beat out the time and place,Through which no lesson of this life is hard,No struggle vain of science or of art,That dies with failure written on its face.

The flute, whence Summer’s dreamy finger-tipsDrew music,—ripening the cramped kernels inThe burly chestnut and the chinquapin,Red-rounding-out the oval haws and hips,—Now Winter crushes to his stormy lips,And surly songs whistle around his chin;Now the wild days and wilder nights beginWhen, at the eaves, the lengthening icicle drips.Thy songs, O Summer, are not lost so soon!Still dwells a memory in thy hollow flute,Which unto Winter’s masculine airs doth giveThy own creative qualities of tune,Through which we see each bough bend white with fruit,Each branch with bloom, in snow commemorative.

All day the clouds hung ashen with the cold;And through the snow the muffled waters fell;The day seemed drowned in grief too deep to tell,Like some old hermit whose last bead is told.At eve the wind woke, and the snow clouds rolledAside to leave the fierce sky visible;Harsh as an iron landscape of wan HellThe dark hills hung framed in with gloomy gold.And then, towards night, the wind seemed some one atMy window, wailing: now a little childCrying outside my door; and now the longHowl of some starved beast down the flue.—I satAnd knew ’twas Winter with his madman songOf miseries on which he stared and smiled.

First came the rain, loud, with sonorous lips;A pursuivant who heralded a prince:And dawn put on her livery of tints,And dusk bound gold about her hair and hips:And, all in silver mail, the sunlight came,A knight, who bade the winter let him pass;And freed imprisoned beauty, naked asThe Court of Love, in all her wildflower shame.And so she came, in breeze-borne loveliness,Across the hills; and heav’n bent down to bless:Above her head the birds were as a choir;And at her feet, like some strong worshiper,The shouting water pæan’d praise of her,Who, with blue eyes, set the wild world on fire.

It is the time when, by the forest falls,The touch-me-nots hang faery folly-caps;When ferns and flowers fill the lichened lapsOf rocks with color, rich as orient shawls:And in my heart I hear a voice that callsMe woodward, where the hamadryad wrapsHer limbs in bark, and, bubbling in the saps,Sings the sweet Greek of Pan’s old madrigals:There is a gleam that lures me up the stream—A Naiad swimming with wet limbs of light?Perfume that leads me on from dream to dream—An oread’s footprints flowering into flight?And, lo! meseems I am a Faun again,One with the myths that I pursue in vain.

There is a music of immaculate love,That beats within the virginal veins of Spring,—And trillium blossoms, (like the stars that clingTo fairies’ wands;) and, strung on sprays above,White-hearts and mandrake blooms, (that look enoughLike the elves’ washing—white with launderingOf May-moon dews;) and all pale-openingWildflowers of the woods are born thereof.There is no sod Spring’s white foot brushes butMust feel the music that vibrates within,And thrill to the communicated touchResponsive harmonies, that must unshutThe heart of Beauty for Song’s concrete kin,Emotions—that are flowers—born of such.

Squat-nosed and broad, of big and pompous port;A tavern visage, apoplexy haunts,All pimple-puffed: the Falstaff-like resortOf fat debauchery, whose veined cheek flauntsA flabby purple: rusty-spurred he standsIn rakehell boots and belt, and hanger thatClaps when, with greasy gauntlets on his hands,He swaggers past in cloak and slouch-plumed hat.Aggression marches armies in his words;And in his oaths great deeds ride cap-à-pie;His looks, his gestures breathe the breath of swords;And in his carriage camp all wars to be:—With him, of battles there shall be no lackWhile buxom wenches are and stoops of sack.

Dark in the west the sunset’s sombre wrackUnrolled vast walls the rams of war had split,Along whose battlements the battle litTempestuous beacons; and, with gates hurled back,A mighty city, red with ruin and sack,Through burning breaches, crumbling bit by bit,Showed where the God of Slaughter seemed to sitWith Conflagration glaring at each crack.—Who knows? perhaps as sleep unto us makesOur dreams as real as our waking seemsWith recollections time can not destroy,So in the mind of Nature now awakes,Haply, some wilder memory, and she dreamsThe stormy story of the fall of Troy.

From morn till noon upon the window-paneThe tempest tapped with rainy finger-nails,And all the afternoon the blustering galesBeat at the door with furious feet of rain.The rose, near which the lily’s bloom lay slain,Like some red wound dripped by the garden rails,On which the sullen slug left silvery trails—It seemed the sun would never shine again.Then in the drench, long, loud, and clarion-clear,—A skyey herald tabarded in blue,—A bluebird warbled ... and at once a bowWas bent in heaven, and I seemed to hearGod’s sapphire spaces crystallizing throughThe strata’d clouds in azure tremolo.

Written of Colossal Cave, Kentucky.

Aisles and abysses; leagues, no man explores,Of rock that labyrinths and night that drips;Where everlasting silence broods, with lipsOf adamant, o’er earthquake-builded floors.Where forms, such as the Dæmon-World adores,Laborious water carves; whence echo slipsWild-tongued o’er pools where petrifaction stripsHer breasts of crystal from which crystal pours.—Here where primordial fear, the Gorgon, sits,Staring all life to stone in ghastly mirth,I seem to tread, with awe no tongue can tell,—Beneath vast domes, by torrent-tortured pits,’Mid wrecks terrific of the ruined Earth,—An ancient causeway of forgotten Hell.

Oh, for a soul that fulfillsMusic like that of a bird!Thrilling with rapture the hills,Heedless if any one heard.Or, like the flower that bloomsLone in the midst of the trees,Filling the woods with perfumes,Careless if any one sees.Or, like the wandering wind,Over the meadows that swings,Bringing wild sweets to mankind,Knowing not that which it brings.Oh, for a way to impartBeauty, no matter how hard!Like unto Nature, whose artNever once dreams of reward.

Oh, for a soul that fulfillsMusic like that of a bird!Thrilling with rapture the hills,Heedless if any one heard.

Or, like the flower that bloomsLone in the midst of the trees,Filling the woods with perfumes,Careless if any one sees.

Or, like the wandering wind,Over the meadows that swings,Bringing wild sweets to mankind,Knowing not that which it brings.

Oh, for a way to impartBeauty, no matter how hard!Like unto Nature, whose artNever once dreams of reward.

She walks with the wind on the windy heightWhen the rocks are loud and the waves are white,And all night long she calls through the night,“O my children, come home!”Her bleak gown, torn as a tattered cloud,Tosses around her like a shroud,While over the deep her voice rings loud,—“O my children, come home, come home!O my children, come home!”

Who is she who wanders alone,When the wind drives sheer and the rain is blown?Who walks all night and makes her moan,“O my children, come home!”Whose face is raised to the blinding gale;Whose hair blows black and whose eyes are pale,While over the world goes by her wail,—“O my children, come home, come home!O my children, come home!”

She walks with the wind in the windy wood;The dark rain drips from her hair and hood,And her cry sobs by, like a ghost pursued,“O my children, come home!”Where the trees loom gaunt and the rocks stretch drear,The owl and the fox crouch back in fear,As wild through the wood her voice they hear,—“O my children, come home, come home!O my children, come home!”

Who is she who shudders byWhen the boughs blow bare and the dead leaves fly?Who walks all night with her wailing cry,“O my children, come home!”Who, strange of look, and wild of tongue,With wan feet wounded and hands wild-wrung,Sweeps on and on with her cry, far-flung,—“O my children, come home, come home!O my children, come home!”

’Tis the Spirit of Autumn, no man sees,The mother of Death and of Mysteries,Who cries on the wind all night to these,“O my children, come home!”The Spirit of Autumn, pierced with pain,Calling her children home again,Death and Dreams, through ruin and rain,—“O my children, come home, come home!O my children, come home!”

Do you know the way that goesOver fields of rue and rose,—Warm of scent and hot of hue,Roofed with heaven’s bluest blue,—To the Vale of Dreams Come True?Do you know the path that twines,Banked with elder bosks and vines,Under boughs that shade a stream,Hurrying, crystal as a gleam,To the Hills of Love a-Dream?Tell me, tell me, have you goneThrough the fields and woods of dawn,Meadowlands and trees that roll,Great of grass and huge of bole,To the Land of Hearts Made Whole?On the way, among the fields,Poppies lift vermilion shields,In whose hearts the golden Noon,Murmuring her drowsy tune,Rocks the sleepy bees that croon.On the way, amid the woods,Mandrakes muster multitudes,’Mid whose blossoms, white as tusk,Glides the glimmering Forest-Dusk,With her moths of fluttering musk.Here you hear the stealthy stirOf shy lives of hoof and fur;Harmless things that hide and peer,Hearts that sucked the milk of fear—Fox and rabbit, squirrel and deer.Here you see the mossy flightOf faint forms that love the night—Whippoorwill and owlet-things,Whose weird call before you bringsWonder-worlds of happenings.Now in sunlight, now in shade,Water, like a brandished blade,Foaming forward, wild of flight,Startles, then arrests the sight,Whirling steely loops of light.Through the tree-tops, down the vale,Breezes roam, and leave a trailOf cool music that the birds,—Following in happy herds,—Gather up in twittering words.Blossoms, frail and manifold,Shower the way with pearl and gold;Blurs, that seem the darling printOf the Springtime’s feet, or glintOf her twinkling gown’s torn tint.There the Myths of old endure:Dreams that are the world-soul’s cure;Things that have no place or playIn the facts of EverydayRound your presence smile and sway.Suddenly your eyes may see,Stepping softly from a tree,—Slim of form and wet with dew,—The brown Dryad; lips the hueOf a berry bit into.You may mark the Naiad riseFrom her pool’s reflected skies;In her gaze the heaven that dreams,Starred, in twilight-haunted streams,Mixed with water’s grayer gleams.You may see the laurel’s girth,Big with bloom, give fragrant birthTo the Oread whose hair,—Musk and darkness, light and air,—Fills the hush with wonder there.You may mark the rocks divide,And the Faun before you glide,Piping on a magic reed,Sowing many a music-seed,From which bloom and mushroom bead.Of the rain and sunlight born,Young of beard and young of horn,You may see the Satyr lie,With a very knowing eye,Teaching fledgeling birds to fly.These shall cheer and follow youThrough the Vale of Dreams Come True:Wind-like voices, leaf-like feet;Forms of mist and hazy heat,In whose pulses sunbeams beat.Lo! you tread enchanted ground!From the hollows all aroundElf and spirit, gnome and fay,Guide your feet along the wayTill the dewy close of day.Then beside you, jet on jet,Emerald-hued and violet,Flickering, floats a firefly light,Aye to guide your steps arightFrom the valley to the height.Steep the way is; when at last,Vale and wood and stream are passed,From the heights you shall beholdPanther heavens of spotted goldTiger-tawny deeps unfold.You shall see on stocks and stonesSunset’s bell-deep color tonesFallen; and the valleys filledWith dusk’s purple music, spilledOn the silence, rapture-thrilled.Then, as answering bell greets bell,Night ring in her miracleOf the doméd dark, o’er-rolled,Note on note, with starlight cold,’Twixt the moon’s broad peal of gold.On the hill-top Love-a-DreamShows you then her window-gleam;Brings you home and folds your soulIn the peace of vale and knoll,In the Land of Hearts Made Whole.

Do you know the way that goesOver fields of rue and rose,—Warm of scent and hot of hue,Roofed with heaven’s bluest blue,—To the Vale of Dreams Come True?

Do you know the path that twines,Banked with elder bosks and vines,Under boughs that shade a stream,Hurrying, crystal as a gleam,To the Hills of Love a-Dream?

Tell me, tell me, have you goneThrough the fields and woods of dawn,Meadowlands and trees that roll,Great of grass and huge of bole,To the Land of Hearts Made Whole?

On the way, among the fields,Poppies lift vermilion shields,In whose hearts the golden Noon,Murmuring her drowsy tune,Rocks the sleepy bees that croon.

On the way, amid the woods,Mandrakes muster multitudes,’Mid whose blossoms, white as tusk,Glides the glimmering Forest-Dusk,With her moths of fluttering musk.

Here you hear the stealthy stirOf shy lives of hoof and fur;Harmless things that hide and peer,Hearts that sucked the milk of fear—Fox and rabbit, squirrel and deer.

Here you see the mossy flightOf faint forms that love the night—Whippoorwill and owlet-things,Whose weird call before you bringsWonder-worlds of happenings.

Now in sunlight, now in shade,Water, like a brandished blade,Foaming forward, wild of flight,Startles, then arrests the sight,Whirling steely loops of light.

Through the tree-tops, down the vale,Breezes roam, and leave a trailOf cool music that the birds,—Following in happy herds,—Gather up in twittering words.

Blossoms, frail and manifold,Shower the way with pearl and gold;Blurs, that seem the darling printOf the Springtime’s feet, or glintOf her twinkling gown’s torn tint.

There the Myths of old endure:Dreams that are the world-soul’s cure;Things that have no place or playIn the facts of EverydayRound your presence smile and sway.

Suddenly your eyes may see,Stepping softly from a tree,—Slim of form and wet with dew,—The brown Dryad; lips the hueOf a berry bit into.

You may mark the Naiad riseFrom her pool’s reflected skies;In her gaze the heaven that dreams,Starred, in twilight-haunted streams,Mixed with water’s grayer gleams.

You may see the laurel’s girth,Big with bloom, give fragrant birthTo the Oread whose hair,—Musk and darkness, light and air,—Fills the hush with wonder there.

You may mark the rocks divide,And the Faun before you glide,Piping on a magic reed,Sowing many a music-seed,From which bloom and mushroom bead.

Of the rain and sunlight born,Young of beard and young of horn,You may see the Satyr lie,With a very knowing eye,Teaching fledgeling birds to fly.

These shall cheer and follow youThrough the Vale of Dreams Come True:Wind-like voices, leaf-like feet;Forms of mist and hazy heat,In whose pulses sunbeams beat.

Lo! you tread enchanted ground!From the hollows all aroundElf and spirit, gnome and fay,Guide your feet along the wayTill the dewy close of day.

Then beside you, jet on jet,Emerald-hued and violet,Flickering, floats a firefly light,Aye to guide your steps arightFrom the valley to the height.

Steep the way is; when at last,Vale and wood and stream are passed,From the heights you shall beholdPanther heavens of spotted goldTiger-tawny deeps unfold.

You shall see on stocks and stonesSunset’s bell-deep color tonesFallen; and the valleys filledWith dusk’s purple music, spilledOn the silence, rapture-thrilled.

Then, as answering bell greets bell,Night ring in her miracleOf the doméd dark, o’er-rolled,Note on note, with starlight cold,’Twixt the moon’s broad peal of gold.

On the hill-top Love-a-DreamShows you then her window-gleam;Brings you home and folds your soulIn the peace of vale and knoll,In the Land of Hearts Made Whole.

From the hills and far awayAll the long, warm summer dayComes the Wind and seems to say:“Come, oh, come! and let us goWhere the meadows bend and blow,Waving with the white-tops’ snow.“’Neath the hyssop-colored sky’Mid the meadows we will lieWatching the white clouds roll by;“While your hair my hands shall pressWith a cooling tendernessTill your grief grows less and less:“Come, oh, come! and let us roamWhere the rock-cut waters combFlowing crystal into foam.“Under trees whose trunks are brown,On the banks that violets crown,We will watch the fish flash down;“While my voice your ear shall sootheWith a whisper soft and smoothTill your care shall wax uncouth.“Come! where forests, line on line,—Armies of the oak and pine,—Scale the hills and shout and shine.“We will wander, hand in hand,Ways where tall the toadstools stand,Mile-stones white of Fairyland.“While your eyes my lips shall kiss,Dewy as a wild-rose is,Till they gaze on naught but bliss.“On the meadows you will hear,Leaning low your spirit ear,Cautious footsteps drawing near.“You will deem it but a bee,Murmuring soft and sleepily,Till your inner sight shall see“’Tis a presence passing slow,All its shining hair ablow,Through the white-tops’ tossing snow.“By the waters, if you will,And your inmost soul is still,Melody your ears shall fill.“You will deem it but the streamRippling onward in a dream,Till upon your gaze shall gleam“Arm of spray and throat of foam—’Tis a spirit there a-roamWhere the radiant waters comb.“In the forest, if you heed,You shall hear a magic reedSow sweet notes like silver seed.“You will deem your ears have heardStir of tree or song of bird,Till your startled eyes are blurred“By a vision, instant seen,Naked gold and naked green,Glimmering the boughs between.“Follow me! and you shall seeWonder-worlds of mysteryThat are only known to me!”Thus outside my city doorSpeaks the Wind its wildwood lore,Speaks, and lo! I go once more.

From the hills and far awayAll the long, warm summer dayComes the Wind and seems to say:

“Come, oh, come! and let us goWhere the meadows bend and blow,Waving with the white-tops’ snow.

“’Neath the hyssop-colored sky’Mid the meadows we will lieWatching the white clouds roll by;

“While your hair my hands shall pressWith a cooling tendernessTill your grief grows less and less:

“Come, oh, come! and let us roamWhere the rock-cut waters combFlowing crystal into foam.

“Under trees whose trunks are brown,On the banks that violets crown,We will watch the fish flash down;

“While my voice your ear shall sootheWith a whisper soft and smoothTill your care shall wax uncouth.

“Come! where forests, line on line,—Armies of the oak and pine,—Scale the hills and shout and shine.

“We will wander, hand in hand,Ways where tall the toadstools stand,Mile-stones white of Fairyland.

“While your eyes my lips shall kiss,Dewy as a wild-rose is,Till they gaze on naught but bliss.

“On the meadows you will hear,Leaning low your spirit ear,Cautious footsteps drawing near.

“You will deem it but a bee,Murmuring soft and sleepily,Till your inner sight shall see

“’Tis a presence passing slow,All its shining hair ablow,Through the white-tops’ tossing snow.

“By the waters, if you will,And your inmost soul is still,Melody your ears shall fill.

“You will deem it but the streamRippling onward in a dream,Till upon your gaze shall gleam

“Arm of spray and throat of foam—’Tis a spirit there a-roamWhere the radiant waters comb.

“In the forest, if you heed,You shall hear a magic reedSow sweet notes like silver seed.

“You will deem your ears have heardStir of tree or song of bird,Till your startled eyes are blurred

“By a vision, instant seen,Naked gold and naked green,Glimmering the boughs between.

“Follow me! and you shall seeWonder-worlds of mysteryThat are only known to me!”

Thus outside my city doorSpeaks the Wind its wildwood lore,Speaks, and lo! I go once more.

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