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THE DEAD SINGER
A POET’S soul has sung its way to God; | |
| Has loosed its luminous wings from earthly thongs, | |
| And soared to join the imperishable throngs | |
| Whose feet the immaculate valleys long have trod. | |
| For him, the recompense; for us, the rod; | 5 |
| And we to whom regretfulness belongs | |
| Crown our dead singer with his own sweet songs, | |
| And roof his grave with love’s remembering sod. | |
| But yesterday, a beacon on the height; | |
| To-day, a splendor that has passed us by,— | 10 |
| So, one by one into the morning light, | |
| Whilst yet late watchers gaze upon the sky | |
| And wonder what the heavens prophesy, | |
| The shining stars pass silently from sight! | |
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VIRTUOSA
AS by the instrument she took her place, | 15 |
| The expectant people, breathing sigh nor word, | |
| Sat hushed, while o’er the waiting ivory stirred | |
| Her supple hands with their suggestive grace. | |
| With sweet notes they began to interlace, | |
| And then with lofty strains their skill to gird, | 20 |
| Then loftier still, till all the echoes heard | |
| Entrancing harmonies float into space. | |
| She paused, and gaily trifled with the keys | |
| Until they laughed in wild delirium, | |
| Then, with rebuking fingers, from their glees | 25 |
| She led them one by one till all grew dumb, | |
| And music seemed to sink upon its knees, | |
| A slave her touch could quicken or benumb. | |
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AT SET OF SUN
A SCENT of guava-blossoms and the smell | |
| Of bruisëd grass beneath the tamarind-trees; | 30 |
| The hurried humming of belated bees | |
| With pollen-laden thighs; far birds that tell | |
| With faint, last notes of night’s approaching spell, | |
| While smoke of supper-fires the low sun sees | |
| Creep through the roofs of palm, and on the breeze | 35 |
| Floats forth the message of the evening bell. | |
| Our footsteps pause, we look toward the west, | |
| And from my heart throbs out one fervent prayer: | |
| O love! O silence! ever to be thus,— | |
| A silence full of love and love its best, | 40 |
| Till in our evening years we two shall share | |
| Together, side by side, life’s Angelus! | |
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DOWN THE BAYOU
THE CYPRESS swamp around me wraps its spell, | |
| With hushing sounds in moss-hung branches there, | |
| Like congregations rustling down to prayer, | 45 |
| While Solitude, like some unsounded bell, | |
| Hangs full of secrets that it cannot tell, | |
| And leafy litanies on the humid air | |
| Intone themselves, and on the tree-trunks bare | |
| The scarlet lichen writes her rubrics well. | 50 |
| The cypress-knees take on them marvellous shapes | |
| Of pygmy nuns, gnomes, goblins, witches, fays, | |
| The vigorous vine the withered gum-tree drapes, | |
| Across the oozy ground the rabbit plays, | |
| The moccasin to jungle depths escapes, | 55 |
| And through the gloom the wild deer shyly gaze. | |
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RESERVE
THE SEA tells something, but it tells not all | |
| That rests within its bosom broad and deep; | |
| The psalming winds that o’er the ocean sweep | |
| From compass point to compass point may call, | 60 |
| Nor half their music unto earth let fall; | |
| In far, ethereal spheres night knows to keep | |
| Fair stars whose rays to mortals never creep, | |
| And day uncounted secrets holds in thrall. | |
| He that is strong is stronger if he wear | 65 |
| Something of self beyond all human clasp,— | |
| An inner self, behind unlifted folds | |
| Of life, which men can touch not nor lay bare: | |
| Thus great in what he gives the world to grasp, | |
| Is greater still in that which he withholds. | 70 |
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HER HOROSCOPE
’T IS true, one half of woman’s life is hope | |
| And one half resignation. Between there lies | |
| Anguish of broken dreams,—doubt, dire surprise, | |
| And then is born the strength with all to cope. | |
| Unconsciously sublime, life’s shadowed slope | 75 |
| She braves; the knowledge in her patient eyes | |
| Of all that love bestows and love denies, | |
| As writ in every woman’s horoscope! | |
| She lives, her heart-beats given to others’ needs, | |
| Her hands, to lift for others on the way | 80 |
| The burdens which their weariness forsook. | |
| She dies, an uncrowned doer of great deeds. | |
| Remembered? Yes, as is for one brief day | |
| The rose one leaves in some forgotten book. | |
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