xt741n7xm178 https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt741n7xm178/data/mets.xml Cawein, Madison Julius, 1865-1914. 1901  books b92-184-30604775 English Richard G. Badger, : Boston : Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. One day & another  : a lyrical eclogue / Madison Cawein. text One day & another  : a lyrical eclogue / Madison Cawein. 1901 2002 true xt741n7xm178 section xt741n7xm178 


ONE DAY AND ANOTHER
    A Lyrical Eclogue

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ONE DAY







A N O T H E R

    A Lyrical Ec/ogue
            S
  MADISON CAWEIN
            S
 THE LYRIC LIBRARY



      B O S T O N
RICHARD G BADGER  COMPANY
       (Incorporated)
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               Copyright 1901 by
           RICHARD G BADGER  CO.
                (Incorporated)
















  The poem herewith presented was first pub-
lished some ten years ago in a volume entitled
Days and Dreams.    The original verses have
been re-written throughout and extensively
added to, making it comparatively a new poem.



L -KEVIEW PRES8, SOUTH FRAMINGUAM, MASS.

 




               TO
            G. F. M.
THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED IN MEMORY
         OF MANY DAYS.

 This page in the original text is blank.

 


What though I dreamed of mountain heights,
  Of peaks, the barriers of the world,
Around chose tops the Northern Lights
  And tempests are unfurled.

Mine are the footpaths leading through
  Life's lowly fields and woods,-with rifts,
Above, of heaven's Eden blue,-
  By which the violet lifts

Its shy appeal; and holding up
  Its chaliced gold, like some wild wine,
Along the hillside, cup on cup,
  Blooms bright the celandine.

Where soft upon each flowering stock
  The butterfly spreads damask wings;
And under grassy loawn and rock
  The cottage cricket sings.

Where overhead eve blooms with fire,
  In which the new moon bends her bow,
And, arrow-like, one white star by her
  Burns through the afterglow.



7

 


I care not, so the sesame
  I find; the magic fiower there,
Whose touch unseals each mystery
  In water, earth and air.

That in the oak tree lets me hear
  Its heart's deep speech, its soul's wise words;
And to my mind makes crystal clear
  The melodies of birds.

Why should I care, who live aloof
Beyond the din of life and dust,
While dreams still share my humble roof,
And love makes sweet my crust



8


 


ONE DAY AND ANOTHER

           A Lyrical Eclogue

                  PART I

            LATE SPRING

 The mottled moth at eventide
   Beats glimmering wings against the pane;
 The slow, sweet lily opens wide,
   White in the dusk like some dim stai;
 The garden dreams on every side
   And breathes faint scents of rain.
 Among the flowering stocks they stand:
   A crimson rose is in his hand.

                    1

  Outside her garden. He waits mu-sing.

  Herein the dearness of her is;
  The thirty perfect days of June
  Made one, in maiden loveliness
  Were not more sweet to clasp and kiss,
  With love not more in tune.

  Ah me! I think she is too true,
  Too spiritual for life's rough way;
  For in her eyes her soul looks new-



9

 


Two bluet blossoms, watchet-blue,
Are not so pure as they.

So good, so beautiful is she,
So soft and white, so fond and fair,
Sometimes my heart fears she may be
Not long for me, and secretly
A sister of the air.

                    2

  Dusk deepens. A whippoorwill calls.

The whippoorwills are calling where
  The golden west is graying;
c'Tis time," they say, "to meet him there-
  Why are you still delaying

"He waits you where the old beech throws
  Its gnarly shadow over
Wood-violet and the bramble rose,
  Frail maiden-fern and clover.

"Where elder and the sumach creep
  Above your garden's paling,
Whereon at noon the lizards sleep
  Like lichens on the railing.

"Come! ere the early rising moon's
  Gold floods the violet valleys;



10

 



  Where mists, like phantom picaroons
    Anchor their stealthy galleys.

  "Come! while the deepening amethyst
    Of dusk above is falling-
  'Tis time to tryst! 'tis time to tryst!"
    The whippoorwills are calling.

  They call you to these twilight ways
    With dewy odor dripping-
  Ah, girlhood, through the rosy haze
    Come like a moonbeam slipping.

                     3

  He enters her garden, speaking dreamily:

There is a fading inward of the day,
  And all the pansy heaven clasps one star;
The dwindling acres eastward glimmer gray,
  While all the world to westward smoulders
        far.

Now to your glass will you pass for the last
        time 
  Pass! humming some ballad, I know,-
Here where I wait it is late and is past time-
  Late! and the moments are slow, are slow.



11

 




There is a drawing downward of the night;
  The bridegroom Heaven bends down to kiss
        the moon;
Above, the heights hang silver in her light;
  Below, the woods stretch purple, deep in
        June.

There in the dew is it you hiding lawny
  You, or a moth in the vines-
You! -by your hand, where the band twinkles
tawny!
You!-by your ring, like a glowworm, that
        shines!
                     4

  She approaches, laughing. She speaks,-

        You'd given up hope

                    HE

                        Believe me.

                   SHE

        Why, is your love so poor

                    HE

               I knew you'd not deceive me.



12

 



SIIE



As many a girl before,-
  Ah, dear, you will forgive me

                 HE

      Say no more, sweet, say no more!

                 SHE



Love trusts, and that's enough, my dear.
Trust wins to trust; whereof, my dear,
Love holds to love; and love, my dear,
  Is-well, that's all my lore.

                 HE

Come, pay me or I'll scold you.-
Give me the kiss you owe.-
You fly when I'd enfold you

                 SHE



  No! no! I say! now, no!
How often have I told you,
You must not treat me so

                 HE

More sweet the dusk for this is,
For lips that meet in kisses.-



13

 


   Come! come! why run from blisses
     As from a mortal foe

                     5

  She stands smiling at him. She speaks:

How many words in the asking!
How easily I can grieve you!
My "no" in a "yes" was a-masking,
Nor thought, dear, to deceive you.--
A kiss-the humming-bird happiness here
In my heart consents . . But what are words,
When the thought of two souls in speech ac-
        cords
Affirmative, negative-what are they, dear
I wished to say "yes," but somehow said "no."
The woman within me thought you would know
Thought that your heart would hear.

                He speaks:

So many hopes in a wooing!
Therein you could not deceive me;
Some things are sweeter for the pursuing-
I knew what you meant, believe me.-
Bunched bells of the blush pomegranate, to fix
At your throat . . six drops of fire they are . .
Will you look where the moon and its following
    star
Rise silvery over yon meadow ricks



14

 



While I hold-while I lean your head back, so-
For I know it is"yes"though you whisper "no,"
And my kisses, sweet, are six.

                     6

 Moths flutter around them. She speaks:

    Look!-where the fiery
    Glow-worm in briery
    Blanks of the moon-mellowed bowers
    Sparkles-how hazily
    Pinioned and arily
    Delicate, warily,
    Drowsily, lazily,
    Flutter the moths to the flowers.

    White as the dreamiest
    Bud of the creamiest
    Rose in the garden that dozes,
    See how they cling to them!
    Held in the heart of their
    Hearts like a part of their
    Perfume they swine to them
    Wings that are soft as the roses.

    Dim as the forming of
    Dew in the warming of
    Moonlight, they light on the petals;
    All is revealed to them;
    All-from the sunniest
    Tips to the honiest



15

 



Heart, whence they yield to them
Spice through the darkness that settles.

So to our tremulous
Souls come the emulous
Spirits of love; through whose power
All that is best in us,
All that is beautiful,
All that is dutiful,
Is made confessed in us,
Even as the scent of a flower.

                 7

     Taking her hand, he says:

  What makes you beautiful
  Answer., now, answer !-
  Is it that dutiful
  Souls are all beautiful
  Is't that romance or
  Beauty of spirit,
  Which souls of merit
  Of heaven inherit -
  Have you no answer

          She roguishly:

 What makes you lovable
 Answer, dear, answer !-



16

 


      Is it not provable
      That man is lovable
      Just because chance or
      Nature makes woman
      Love him-Her human
      Part's to illumine.-
      Have you no answer

                     8

Then, regarding him seriously, she continues:

Could I recall every joy that befell me
  There in the past with its anguish and bliss,
Here in my heart it has whispered to tell me,
  Those were no joys like this.

Were it not well if our love could forget them
  Veiling the was with the dawn of the is
Dead with the pastwe should neverregret them,
  Being no joys like this.

When they were gone and the Present stood
        speechful,
  Ardent in word and in look and in kiss,
What though we know that their eyes are be-
        seechful,
  Those were no joys like this.

Is it not well to have more of the spirit,
  Living for Futures where naught is amiss,



17

 



Less of the flesh with the Past pining near it
  Is there a joy like this

                     9

Leaving the garden for the lane.   He, with
             lightness of heart.

          We will leave reason,
          Sweet, for a season;
          Reason were treason
          Now that the nether
          Spaces are clad, oh,
          In silvery shadow-
          We will be glad, oh,
          Glad as this weather!

        She, responding to his mood:

Heart unto heart, where the moonlight is
        slanted,
Let us believe that our souls are enchanted:-
I in the castle-keep; you are the airy
Prince who comes seeking me; Love is the
        Fairy
Bringing our hearts together.

                    HIE

          Starlight in masses
          Over us passes;



18

 


          And in the grass is
          Many a flower:
          Now will you tell me
          iHow'd you enspell me
          What once befell me
          There in your bower9

                    SHE

Soul unto soul-in the moon's wizard glory,
Let us believe we are parts in a story:-
I am. a poem; a poet you hear it
WAhispered in star and in flower; a Spirit,
Love, puts my soul in your power.

                    10

     He, suddently and very earitestly:

     Perhaps we lived in the days
     Of the Khalif Haroun er Reshid;
     And loved, as the story says
     Did the Sultan's favorite one
     And the Persian Emperor's son,
     Ali ben Bekkar, he
     Of the Kisra dynasty.

     Do you know the story  Well,
     You were Haroun's Sultana.
     When night on the palace fell,
     A slave through a secret door,



19

 


Low-arched on the Tigris' shore,-
By a hidden winding stair
Brought me to your bower there.

Then there was laughter and mirth,
And feasting and singing together,
In a chamber of wonderful worth;
In a chamber vaulted high
On columns of ivory;
Its dome, like the irised skies,
Mooned over with peacock eyes;
Its curtains and furniture,
Damask and juniper.

Ten slave girls-like unto blooms--
Stand, holding tamarisk torches,
Silk-clad from the Irak looms;
Ten handmaidens serve the feast,
Each girl like a star in the east;
Ten lutanists, lutes a-tune,
Wait, each like the Ramadan moon.

For you in a stuff of Merv
Blue-clad, unveiled and jewelled,
No metaphor known may serve:
Scarved deep with your raven hair,
The jewels like fireflies there,
Blossom and moon and star,
The Lady Shemsennehar.

The zone that girdles your waist
Would ransom a Prince and Emeer;



20

 


In your coronet's gold enchased,
And your bracelet's twisted bar,
Burn rubies of Istakhar;
And pearls of the Jamshid race
Hang looped on your bosom's lace.



You stand like the letter I;
Dawn-faced, with eyes that sparkle
Black stars in a rosy sky;
Mouth like a cloven peach,
Sweet with your smiling speech;
Cheeks that the blood presumes
To make pomegranate blooms.



With roses of Rocknabad,
Hyacinths of Bokhara,-
Creamily cool and clad
In gauze,-girls scatter the floor
From pillar to cedarn door.
Then a poppy-bloom at each ear,
Come the dancing girls of Kashineer.

Kohl in their eyes, down the room,-
That opaline casting-bottles
Have showered with rose perfume,-
They glitter and drift and swoon
To the dulcimer's languishing tune;
In the liquid light like stars,
And moons and nenuphars.



21

 


Carbuncles, tragacanth-red,
Smoulder in armlet and anklet;
Gleaming on breast and on head
Bangles of coins, that are angled,
Tinkle; and veils, that are spangled,
Flutter from coiffure and wrist
Like a star-bewildered mist.

Each dancing-girl is a flower
Of the Tuba from vales of El Liwa.-
How the bronzen censers glower!
And scents of ambergris pour
And myrrh brought of Lahore,
And musk of Khoten! how good
Is the scent of the sandal-wood!

A lutanist smites her lute;
Sings loves of Mejnoon and Leila-
Her voice is a houri flute;-
While the fragrant flambeaux wave
Barbaric o'er free and slave,
O'er fabrics and bezels of gems
And roses in anadems.

Sherbets in ewers of gold,
Fruits in salvers carnelian;
Flagons of grotesque mold,
Made of a sapphire glass,
Brimmed with wine of Shiraz;



22

 


Shaddock and melon and grape
On plate of an antique shape.

Vases of frosted rose,
Of limpid alabaster,
Filled with the mountain snows;
Goblets of mother-of-pearl,
One filigree silver-swirl;
Vessels of gold foamed up
With spray of spar on the cup.

Then a slave bursts in with a cry:
"The eunuchs! the Khalif's eunuchs!-
With scimitars bared draw nigh!
Wesif and Afif and he,
Chief of the hideous three,
Mesrour!-the Sultan's seen
'Mid a hundred weapons' sheen!"

Did we part when we heard this No!
It seems that my soul remembers
How I clasped you and kissed you, so.
When they came they found us-dead
On the flowers our blood dyed red;
Our lips together, and
The dagger in my hand.



23

 


11



          She, musingly:

How it was I cannot tell,
  For I know not where nor why;
But perhaps we loved too well
  In some world that does not lie
East or west of where we dwell,
  And beneath no mortal sky.

WAas it in the golden ages
  Or the iron-I had heard,-
In the prophecy of sages,-
  Haply, how had come a bird,
Underneath whose wing were pages
  Of an unknown lover's word.

I forget. You may remember
  How the earthquake shook our ships;
How our city, one huge ember,
  Blazed within the thick eclipse.
When you found me-deep December
  Sealed my icy eyes and lips.

I forget. No one may say
  That such things can not be true:-
Here a flower dies to-day,
And to-morrow blooms anew . .
Death is silent.-Tell me, pray,
Why men doubt what God can do



24

 



12



        He, with conviction.

As to that, nothing to tell,
  You being all my belief;
Doubt may not enter or dwell
  Here where your image is chief;
Here where your name is a spell,
  Potent in joy and in grief.

Is it the glamor of spring
  Working in us so we seem
Aye to have loved that we cling
  Even to some fancy or dream,
Rainbowing everything
  Here in our souls with its gleam

See! how the synod is met
  There of the heavens to preach us-
Freed from the earth's oubliette,
  See how the blossoms beseech us-
Were it not well to forget
  Winter and night as they teach us

Dew and a bud and a star,
  These,-like a beautiful thought,
Over man's wisdom how far!-
  God for some purpose has wrought;
And though they're that which they are,
  What are the thoughts they have
        brought



25

 


    Stars and the moon; and they roll
      Over our way that is white.
    Here shall we end the long stroll
      Here shall I kiss you good-night
    Or, for a while, soul to soul,
      Linger and dream of delight

                     13

Thcy enter the garden again... She, somnewhat
                  pensively.

Myths tell of walls and cities that arose
  To melody. But I would build with tone,
Had I that harp, a world for us alone,
  A world of love, and joy, and deep repose.

A land of lavender light, of blue-bell skies;
  Pale peaks that rise against the gold of eve,;
And on one height, the splendors never leave,
  Ouir castled home o'er which the wild swan
            flies.

There, pitiless, the ruined hand of death
  Should never reach. No bud, no thing should
            fade;
All should be perfect, pure, and unafraid;
  And life serener than an angel's breath.

The days should move to music; wildly tame
  The nights should move to music and the
            stars;
                     26

 



And morn and evening in their opal cars,
  Like heralds, banner God's eternal name.

o world! 0 life! desired and to be!
  How shall we reach thee -dark the way and
        dim.
-Give me your hand, love, let us follow him,
  Love with the mystery and the melody.

                     14

le, observing the various flowers around them:

    Violets and anemnones
      The surrendered hours
    Pour, as handsets, round the knees
    Of the Spring, who to the breeze
      Flings her myriad flowers.

    Like to coins the sumptuous day
      Strews with blossoms golden
    Every furlong of his way,-
    Like a Sultan gone to pray
      At a Kaaba olden.

   And the night, with spark on spark,
      Clad in dim attire,
   Dots with Stars the haloed dark,-
   As a priest around the Ark
     Lights his lamps of fire.



27

 



  These are but the cosmic strings
    To the harp of Beauty,
  To that instrument which sings
  In our souls of love that brings
    Peace and faith and duty.

                   15

             She, seriously:

Duty -Comfort of the sinner
  And the saint!-when grief and trial
Weigh us, and within our inner
  Selves,-responsive to love's viol,-
Hope's soft voice grows thin and thinner,
  It is kin to self-denial.

Self-denial !-through whose feeling
  Wae are gainer though we're loser;
All the finer force revealing
  Of our natures. No accuser
Is the conscience then, but healing
  Of the wound of which we're chooser.

Some one said no flower knoweth
  Of the fragrance it revealeth;
Song, its soul that overfloweth,
  Never nightingale's heart feeleth-
Such the love the spirit groweth,
Love unconscious if it healeth.



28

 



16



        He, af ter a pause, lightly:

An elf there is who stables the hot
Red wasp that stings on the apricot;
An elf who rowels his spiteful bay
Like a mote on a ray, away, away;
An elf who saddles the hornet lean
To din i' the ear o' the swinging bean;
Who straddles, with cap cocked all awry,
The bottle-blue back o' the dragon-fly.

And this is the elf who sips and sips
From clover-horns whence the perfume drips;
And, drunk with dew, in the glimmering gloam
Awaits the wild-bee's coming home;
In ambush lies, where none may see,
And robs the caravan bumble-bee-
Gold bags of honey the bees must pay
To the bandit elf of the fairy way.

Another ouphen the butterflies know,
Who paints their wings with the hues that
        glow
On blossoms.-Squeezing from tubes of dew
Pansy colors of every hue
On his bloom's pied pallet, he paints the wings
Of the butterflies, moths, and other things.
This is the elf that the hollyhocks hear,
Who dangles a brilliant in each one's ear;



29

 


Teases at noon the pane's green fly,
And lights at night the glow-worm's eye.

But the dearest elf, so the poets say,
Is the elf who hides in an eye of gray;
Who curls in a dimple and slips along
The strings of a lute to a lover's song;
Who smiles in her smile, and frowns in her
        frown,
And dreams in the scent of her glove or gown;
Hides and beckons as all may note
In the bloom or the bow of a mnaiden's throat.

                     17

      She, staiiding among the flowers:

Soft through the trees the night wind sighs,
And swoons and dies.
Above, the stars hang wanly white;
Here, through the dark,
A drizzled gold, the fireflies
Rain mimic stars in spark on spark.-
'Tis time to part, to say good-night.
Good-night.

From fern to flower the night-moths cross
At drowsy loss.
The moon drifts veiled through clouds of white;
And pearly pale,
A silver blur, through beds of moss,
Their tiny moons the oglTw-worms trail.-



30

 



'Tis time to part, to say good-night.
Good-night.

                   18

    He, at parting, as they proceed down
              the garden:

You say you cannot wed me, now
  That roses and the June are here
To your decision I must bow.-
  Ah, well! 'tis just as well, my dear:
We'll swear again each old love vow,
  And wait another year.

Another year of love with you!
  Of dreams and doubts, of sun and rain!
When field and forest bloom anew,
  And locust clusters pelt the lane,
When all the song-birds wed and woo,
  I'll not take "no" again.

Oft shall I lie awake and mark
  The hours by no clanging clock,
But in the dim and distant dark
  The crowing of some punctual cock;
Then up as early as the lark
  To meet you by our rock.

The rock where first we met at tryst;
  Where first I wooed and won your love-



31

 


Remember how the moon and mist
Made mystery of the heaven above
As now to-night-How first I kissed
  Your lips, you trembling like a dove

So, then, you cannot wed me inow
  That roses and the June are here,
That warmth and fragrance weigh each bough
  And yet your reason is not clear.
Ah, well! We'll swear anew each vow,
And wait another year.



32


 


PART II



           EARLY    SUMMER

 The cricket in the rose-bush hedge
   Sings by the vine-entangled gate;
 The slim moon slants a timid edge
   Of pearl through one low cloud of slate;
 Around dark door and trindow-ledge
   Like dreams the shadows weait.
 And through the sum'Mer dusk she goes,
 On her white breast a crimson rose.

                    I

She delays, meditating. A rainy afternoon.

Gray skies and the foggy rain
   Dripping from sullen eaves;
Over and over again
  Dull drop of the trickling leaves;
And the woodward-winding lane,
  And the hill with its shocks of sheaves
  One scarce perceives.

  Shall I go in such wet weather
  By the lane or over the hill-
Wphere the blossoming milkweed's feather
  The drops like diamonds fill;



33

 


Where, draggled and drenched together,
  The ox-eyes rank the rill,
  To the old corn-mill.

The creek by now is swollen,
  And its foaming cascades sound;
And the lilies, smeared with pollen,
  In the darn look dull and drowned.
'Tis a path I oft have stolen
  To the bridoe that rambles round
  With willows bound.

Through a valley wild with berry,
  Packed thick with the iron-weeds,
And elder.-washed and very
  Fragrant,-the fenced path leads;
Past oak and wilding cherry
  To a place of flags and reeds,
  That the water bredes.

The sun through the sad sky bleaches-
  Is that a thrush that calls
That bird who so beseeches 
  And see! on the balsam's balls,
And leaves of the water-beeches-
  One blister of wart-like galls-
  No raindrop falls.

My Shawl instead of a bonnet! . .
  Though the woods be soaking yet,
Through the wet to the rock I'll run it,-



34

 



  How sweet to meet i' the wet!
Our rock with the vine upon it,-
  Each flower a fiery jet-
  Where oft we've met!

                   2

         Theyi meet. He speakls.

How fresh the purple clover
  Smells in its veil of rain!
And where the leaves brimn over
  How fragrant is the lane!
See, bow the sodden acres,
Forlorn of all their rakers,
Their hay and harvest makers,
  Look green as spring again.

Drops from the trumpet flowers
  Rain on us as we pass;
And every zephyr showers,
  From tilted leaf or grass,
Clear beads of moisture, seeming
Pale, pointed emeralds gleaming;
Where, through the green boughs streaming,
  The daylight strikes like glass.

              Ale speaks.

How dewy, clean and fragrant
  Look now the green and gold!-



35

 


And breezes trailing vagrant
   Spill all the spice they hold.
 The west begins to glimmer;
 And shadows, stretching slimmer,
 Crouch on the ways; and dimmer
   Grow field and forest old.

 Beyond those rainy reaches
   Of woodland, far and lone,
 A whi ppoorwill beseeches;
   And now an owvl's vague moan
 Strikes faint upon the hearing.-
 These say the dusk is nearing.
 And, see, the heavens clearing
   lake on a tender tone.

 How feebly chirps the cricket!
   How thin the tree-toads cry!
 Blurred in the wild-rose thicket
   Gleams wet the firefly.-
 This way toward home is nearest;
 Of weeds and briars clearest . . .
 We'll meet to-morrow. dearest;
   Till then, dear heart, good-bye.

                    q

They mleet again untder the greenwcood tree.
               He speaks:

Here at last! And do you know
   That again you've kept me waiting



36

 



  Wondering, anticipating.
If your "yes" meant "no."

.Now you're here we'll have our day
  Let us take this daisied hollow,
  And beneath these beeches follow
This wild strip of way

Towards the streamn: wherein are seen
  Stealing gar and darting minnow;
  Over which snake-feeders winnow
Wings of black and green.

Like a cactus flames the sun;
  And the mighty weaver, Even.
  Tenuous colored, there in heaven,
His rich weft's begun .

How I love you! from the time-
  You remember, do you not-
  When, within your orchard-plot,
I was reading rhyme,

As I told you. And 't was thus-
  "Bv the blue Trinacrian sea,
  Far in pastoral Sicily
With Theocritus"-

That I answered you who asked.
  But the curious part was this:-



37

 


  That the whole thing was amiss;
That the Greek but masked

Tales of old Boccaccio-
  Tall Decameronian maids
  Strolled among Italian glades,
Smiling, sweet and slow.

And when you approached,-my book
  Dropped in wonder,-seemingly
  To myself I said, " 'Tis she!"
And arose to look

In Lauretta's eyes and-true!
  Found them yours.-You shook your head.
  Laughing at me, as you said,
"Did I frighten you"

You had come for cherries; these
  Dreamily I climbed for while
  You still questioned with a smile,
And still tried to tease.

Ah, love, just two years have gone
  Since then. I remember, you
  Wore a dress of billowy blue
Muslin, or of lawn.

And that apron still I see,-
  White, with cherry-juice red-staiiled,-



38

 


  Which you held; wherein I rained
Ripeness from the tree.

And I asked you-for, you know,
  To my eyes your serious eyes
  Spoke such sweet philosophies,-
If you'd read Rousseau.

You remember how a chance,
  Somewhat like to mine, one June
  Happened him at castle Toune,
Over there in France

And a cherry dropping fair
  On your cheek I, envying it,
  Said-remembering Rousseau's wit-
"Would my lips were there!"

How you laughed and blushed, I know.-
  Here's the stream. The west has narrowed
  To a streak of gold, deep arrowed.-
There's a skiff. Let's row.

                  4

     Entering the skiff, she speaks:

 Waters, flowing dark and bright
   In the sunlight or the moon,
 Seize my soul with such delight



39

 


    As a visible music might;
      As some slow, majestic tune
    Made material to the sight.

    Blossoms colored like the skies,
      Sunset-hued and tame or wild,
    Fill my soul with such surmise
    As the mind might realize
      If our thoughts, all undefiled,
    Should take torm before our eyes.

    So to me do these appeal;
      So they sway me every hour:
    Letting all their beauty steal
    On mv soul to make it feel,
      Through a rivulet or flower,
    More than any words reveal.

                     5

             He speaks, rowcing.

See, sweetheart, how the lilies lay
Their lambent leaves about our way;
Or, pollen-dusty, nod and float
Their moon-like flowers around our boat.-
The middle of the stream we've reached
Three strokes from   where our boat was
        beached.

Look up. You scarce can see the sky,
Through trees that lean, dark, deep, and high;
And coiled with grape and trailing vine



40

 



Build a vast roof of shade and shine;
A house of leaves, where shadows walk,
And whispering winds and waters talk.

There is no path. The saplings choke
The trunks they spring from. There an oak
Lies rotting; and that sycamore,
Which lays its bulk fron shore to shore,-
Uprooted by the floods,-perchance,
May be the bridge to some romance.

Now opening through a willow fringe
The waters creep, one tawny tinge
Of sunset; and on either marge
The cottonwoods make walls of shade;
And, near, the gradual hills loom large
Within its mnirror. Herons wade,
Or fly,, like Faery birds, from grass
That mats the shore by which we pass.

                She speaki7s.

On we pass; we rippling pass,
On sunset waters still as glass.
A vesper-sparrow flies above
Soft twittering to its woodland love.
A whippoorwill now calls afar;
And 'gainst the west, like some swift star,
A glittering jay flies screaming. Slim
The sand-snipes and king-fishers skim
Before us; and some evening thrush-



41

 


Who may discover where such sing--
The silence rinses with a gush
Of mellow music bubbling.

                 lie speakos.

On we pass.- Now let us oar
To yonder strip of ragged shore,
Where, from a rock with lichens hoar,
A ferny spring wells. Gliding by
The sulphur-colored firefly
Lights its pale lamp where inallows gloom,
And wild-bean and wild-mustard bloom.-
Some hunter there within the woods
Last fall encamped those ashes say
And campfire boughs.-The solitudes
Grow dreamy with the death of day.

                     6

                 She sings.

Over the fields of millet
A young bird tries its wings;
And sweet as a woodland rillet,
Its first wild music rings-
Soul of my soul, where the meadows roll
What is the song it sings

"Love, and a glad good-morrow,
Heart where the rapture is!



42

 



Good-morrow, good-morrow!
Adieu to sorrow!
here is the road to bliss:
Where all day long you may hearken my song
And kiss, kiss, kiss!"

Over the fields of clover,
Where the wild bee drones and sways,
The wind, like a shepherd lover,
Flutes on the fragrant ways-
Heart of my heart, where the blossoms part,
What is the air he plays

"Love, and a song to follow,
Soul with the face a-gleam!
Co-lme follow, come follow,
O'er hill and o'er hollow,
To the land o' the bloom and beamer;
Where under the flowers you may listen for
        hours,
And dream, (dream, dlearn!"

                     7
     le specks, letting the boat drift.

  Here the shores are irised. Grasses
  Chuimp the water dark that glasses
  Broken wood and deepened distance.
  Far the musical persistence
  Of a field-lark lingers low
  In the west where tulips blow.



43

 


White before us flames one pointed
Star; and Day hath Night anointed
King; from out her azure ewer
Pouring starry fire, truer
Than pure gold. Star-crowned he stands
With the star-light in his hands.

Will the moon bleach through the ragged
Tree-tops ere we reach yon jagged
Rock, that rises gradually,
Pharos of our homeward valley-
All the west is smouldering red;
Embers are the stars o'erhead.

At my soul some Protean elf is;
You're Simaetha; I am Delphis.
You are Sappho and your Phaon,
I.-We love.-There lies a ray on
All the Dark LEolian seas
'Round the violet Lesbian leas.

On we drift. I love you. Nearer
Looms our island. Rosier, clearer,
The Leucadian cliff we follow,
Where the temple of Apollo
Shines-a pale and pillared fire . . .
Strike, oh, strike the Lydian lyre!
While in Hellas still we seem,
Let us sing of that we dream.



44

 


8



             Landing he sings.

Night, night, 'tis night. The moon drifts low
        above us,
And all its gold is tangled in the stream:
Love, love, my love, and all the stars, that love
        l's,
Tithe stars smile down and every star's a dream.

In odorous purple, where the falling warble
Of water cascades and the plunged foam glows,
A columned ruin lifts its sculptured marble
Friezed with the chiselled rebeck and the rose.

                  She sings.

Sleep, Sleep, sweet Sleep sleeps at the drifting
        tiller,
And in our sail the Spirit of the Rain--
Love, love, May love. ah, bid thy heart be stiller,
And. hark! the music of the resonant main.

WYhat flowers are those that blow their balm
        unto us
From mouths of wild aroma, each a flame-
That breathe of love, of love we know that drew
        us,
That kissed our eyes, so we might see the same.



45

 


He speaks.



Night, night, 'tis night!-no dream is this to
        banish;
The temple and the nightingale are there!
Our love has made them, nevermore to vanish,
Real as yon moon, this wild-rose in your hair.

Night, night, 'tis night!-and love's