RETURN

Ah, it was here--September And silence filled the air-- I came last year to remember, And muse, hid away from care.

It was here I came--the thistle Was trusting her seed to the wind; The quail in the croft gave whistle As now--and the fields lay thinned.

I know how the hay was steeping, Brown mows under mellow haze; How a frail cloud-flock was creeping As now over lone sky-ways.

Just there where the catbird's calling Her mock-hurt note by the shed, The use-worn wain was stalling In the weedy brook's dry bed.

And the cricket, lone little chimer Of day-long dreams in the vines, Chirred on like a doting rhymer O'er-vain of his firstling lines.

He's near me now by the aster, Beneath whose shadowy spray A sultry bee seeps faster As the sun slips down the day.

And there are the tall primroses Like maidens waiting to dance.

They stood in the same shy poses Last year, as if to entrance The stately mulleins to waken From death and lead them around: And still they will stand untaken, Till drops their gold to the ground.

Yes, it was here--September And silence round me yearned.

Again I've come to remember, Again for musing returned To the searing fields' a.s.suaging, And the falling leaves' sad balm: Away from the world's keen waging-- To harvest and hills and calm.

LISETTE

Oh ... there was love in her heart--no doubt of it-- Under the anger.

But see what came out of it!

Not a knave, he!--A smitten rhyme-smatterer, Cloaking in languor And heartache to flatter her.

And just as a woman will--even the best of them-- She yielded--brittle.

G.o.d spare me the rest of them!

For! though but kisses--she swore!--he had of her, Was it so little?

She thought 'twas not bad of her,

Said I would lavish a burning hour-full On any grisette.

And silenced me, powerful!

But she was mine, and blood is inflammable-- For a Lisette!

My rage was undammable....

Could a stiletto's one p.r.i.c.k be prettier?

Look at the gaping.

No?--then you're her pitier!

Pah! she's the better, and I ... I'm your prisoner.

Loose me the strapping-- I'll lay one more kiss on her.

FROM ONE BLIND

I cannot say thy cheek is like the rose, Thy hair like rippled sunbeams, and thine eyes Like violets, April-rich and sprung of G.o.d.

My barren gaze can never know what throes Such boons of beauty waken, tho' I rise Each day a-tremble with the ruthless hope That light will pierce my useless lids--then grope Till night, blind as the worm within his clod.

Yet unto me thou art not less divine, I touch thy cheek--and know the mystery hid Within the twilight breeze; I smooth thy hair And understand how slipping hours may twine Themselves into eternity: yea, rid Of all but love, I kiss thine eyes and seem To see all beauty G.o.d Himself may dream.

Why then should I o'ermuch for earth-sight care?

IN A CEMETERY

When Autumn's melancholy robes the land With silence, and sad fadings mystical Of other years move thro' the mellow fields, I turn unto this meadow of the dead, Strewn with the leaves stormed from October trees, And wonder if my resting shall be dug Here by this cedar's moan or under the sway Of yonder cypress--lair of winds that rove As Valkyries sent from Valhalla's court In search of worthy slain.

And sundry times with questioning I tease The entombed of their estate--seeking to know Whether 'tis sweeter in the grave to feel The oblivion of Nature's silent flow, Or here to wander wistful o'er her face.

Whether the harvesting of pain and joy Which men call Life ends so, or whether death Pours the warm chrism of Immortality Into each human heart whose glow is spent.

And oft the Silence hears me. For a voice Of sighing wind may answer, or a gaze, Though wordless, from a marble seraph's face.

Or sometimes from unspeakable deeps of gold, That ebb along the west, revealings wing And tremble, like ethereal swift tongues Unskilled of human speech, about my heart-- Till youth, age, death, even earth's all, it seems, Are but brave moments wakened in that Soul, To whom infinities are as a span, Eternities as bird-flights o'er the sun, And worlds as sands blown from Sahara's wilds Into the ceaseless surging of the sea....

Then twilight hours lead back my wandered spirit From out the wilderness of mystery Whence none may find a path to the Unknown, And chastened to content I turn me home.

WAKING

Oh, the long dawn, the weary, endless dawn, When sleep's oblivion is torn away From love that died with dying yesterday But still unburied in the heart lies on!

Oh, the sick gray, the twitter in the trees, The sense of human waking o'er the earth!

The quivering memories of love's fair birth Now strown as deathless flowers o'er its decease!

Oh, the regret, and oh, regretlessness, Striving for sovranty within the soul!

Oh, fear that life shall never more be whole, And immortality but make it less!

STORM-EBB

Dusking amber dimly creeps Over the vale, Lit by the kildee's silver sweeps, Sad with his wail.

Eastward swing the silent clouds Into the night.