Songs Ysame

'Twixt Creek and Bay

'TWIXT creek and bayWe whisper to our white sails "stay!Oh, Life, a little while delay!'Twixt creek and bay."So loath to goFrom these calm shallows that we know,We fain would stay the year's swift flow,Nor onward goTo banks more wide,Where seaward drawings of the tideImpel to deeper depths untried,Where Life grows wide.'Twixt creek and bay —The morning deepens into day,And richer freight we bear, alway,When in the bay.

When Youth is Gone

HOW can we know when youth is gone, —When age has surely come at last?There is no marked meridianThrough which we sail, and feel when past.A keener air our faces strike,A chiller current swifter run;They meet and glide like tide with tide,Our youth and age, when youth is done.

The Fickle Heart

CANST tell me, thou inconstant heart,What like unto thou art?A gypsy wandering up and downThrough April's green and Autumn's brown,Until the year is spent;And then, when hills are white with snow,And brooks, ice-bound, have ceased to flow,No place to pitch his tent.

Banditti

UPON Life's lonely highway, robber bandsOf grim-faced years seize with relentless handsEach traveler, and wrest from out his graspThe treasures that he fain would closer clasp.None can escape. Each year demands its toll,Till robbed of youth, we grope toward the goal,Halting and blind, of all but life bereft,And death claims that – the only boon that's left.

The Silent Brotherhood

ON through the cloisters of eternityThe years, like monks, in slow procession pass,Telling their rosary beads, the golden days,With penance prayers of dark and dismal nights.Hooded and cowled, with silence on they pass,Nor will they pause until their vesper ringsA solemn curfew at the sunset hour,When all the fires of life are buried low,And all the worlds drop down upon their knees,To say a last mass ere the death of Time.

Spendthrift

HE was a king one time,And they wrapped the ermine around him,And the bells rang out when they crowned him,Rang with a joyful chime.And he sat on a throne!The wealth that a world could offerWas heaped in the New Year's coffer,For the world was his own.He was a spendthrift though,And the coins of his lavish givingWere the golden moments of living, —Coins that he squandered so.He is a beggar now.In the night and the storm he lingers,No gold in his prodigal fingers, —King with the uncrowned brow.Nothing to call his own!His fortune scattered behind him;Death empty-handed shall find him, —A New Year takes his throne.

Lost

CHILDHOOD flits by with flowers in both its hands, —We know not why it leaves, nor when it goes;But suddenly we miss some subtle grace,As perfume passes from a fading rose;We scarce divine, yet somehow faintly feelIn the soft air a far-blown breath of snows.Straying afar, unheeded and aloneUpon life's highway 'mid the busy throng,Swept in its eager, restless race alongTo the great future, unexplored, unknown,The little child is lost. And when with hasteThe wanderer's footsteps through the streets are traced,They find a man with features pale and stern,But the lost child will nevermore return.

The Robber

DO you know why Time flies by so slowWhen we are sad and old?Why he turns and waits as if loath to goOn his journey cold?Because from our coffers of hope and youth,Where we kept life's gold,He has stolen our treasures all, in sooth,From their sacred hold.He who came with a gift in handWas a robber bold.He whose greeting was smooth and blandWas a wolf in the fold.And this is the reason that he goes by,When we're worn and old,So slowly, because he can scarcely flyWith his weight of gold.

My Carol

'TIS the time when holly berriesGrow red as the Yule-log's glow,And hearth and hall are decked by allWith the green of the mistletoe.Time when the joy of givingIs felt at each fireside,And wings seek rest in the old home nest,For the time is Christmas-tide.Though only a carol singerWith nothing of gold in store,And little to bring as an offering,I stand outside your door.Open! This blessed morningPeace be to thee and thine!Here to you all I gaily callA greeting from me and mine.Haply it may awakenSome joy that so long ago,On the frosty dawn of a Christmas gone,You found in your stocking toe.Though but an old, old carol,It bears love's myrrh and gold,And the frankincense of a joy intenseThat the angel hosts foretold.

Carol

Listen! The heralds proclaim Him!Follow! A star leads the way!Oh, joy, in the City of DavidThe Christ-child reigns to-day!I greet you this blessed morning.Peace be to thee and thine!To the dear ones here be Christmas cheer,And the love of me and mine.

"In This Cradle Life of Ours."

THE world swings slowly back and forth,From dawn to dusk, from dusk to dawn,And we forget the hand that rocks,But, cradle-like, the world swings on.A little while to stir and fret,Or sob with trembling lipBecause the sunbeams we would graspThrough helpless fingers slip.A little while to moan, and startFrom fevered dreams, and weep,For still the cradle sways and swingsUntil we fall asleep.The broad earth's pillow is so softTo weary heads, and who can tellBut through that sleep sound lullabiesOf the white angel, Israfel?

Here and There

HOW must they sing, those angel choirs,Who breathe Heaven's pure, sweet air!They need but waft it from their lipsTo make it music rare.Here on these chill, damp plains below,Where stifling vapors rise,We draw the heavy air of earth,And breathe it out in sighs.

The Milky Way

UP the steep heights whereon God's citadelIs set, the prayers of mortals to that bourne,For ages toiling, in the adamant,Across the sky a glittering path have worn.

INTERLUDE

Interlude

WITHIN the pauses of the anthem falls a hush,And the deep organ's solemn voice goes on aloneIn a low undertone,As rain comes sometimes with a sudden sweeping rush,And then is still, save that it slowly drips and fallsFrom leaves at intervals.So memory sings aloneBetween the busy hours when comes a lull,And naught is audibleBut its low undertone.So darkness drops between the days, an interludeWhen night's low sighing stirs the sleepy solitude.So, when the little cycle of this life is rounded,Before the spirit enters into life unbounded,It waits to hear, with bated breath,The solemn interlude of death.

PART III

"Oh, Dreary Day!"

OH, dreary day, that had so late a dawn!Oh, dreary day, so long, though early gone!Fold thy gray mantle round thy form and goTo find the lost sun, while Night comes on,Across the plain, with silent step and slow.I weary of thy dark, unsmiling mood,I weary of thy dull disquietude,And thy complaining voice that tells of pain,Not with the tempest's trumpet, but subduedIn broken sentences of falling rain.Now, soft as household spirit, comes the NightAnd draws the curtains, fanning still more brightThe cheerful fire, while for her gentle sakeThe tapers burst in bloom with yellow light,Like evening primroses just kissed awake.

May-Time

THE Spring steals through the city streets,Silent and shrinking, half afraid,As if there came, from woods and fields,Some timid, bashful, country maid.The lofty houses coldly frown,And coldly stares the stony street;But here and there from out a cleftThere springs a flower to kiss her feet.And here and there a crocus smilesA friendly greeting, or a sprayOf blooming lilacs, fresh and sweet,Leans down and nods across her way.Till, reassured, she smiles and sings,And on she passes, glad and fleet,And little children at their playLook up to catch her glances sweet.Is it her robe's soft flutteringThat gently fans the passer by?He only feels the freshened air,Nor knows the gracious presence nigh.But some sweet influence he feels,That charms care's gloomy shade away,And pours into his wakened heartThe golden gladness of the May.So, like an angel visitant,She glides among the haunts of men,And faint hearts bound, and sad eyes smile,Because the Spring has come again.

Spring's Cophetua

SHE came with garments scant and poor and thin,And white feet gleaming bare;With pallid smiles where April tears had been,And snowflakes on her hair.Oh, never – Winter thought – such gentle lookIn all the land was seen!From his gray locks the diadem he tookAnd crowned her as his queen.And now, in silken robes and gems arrayed,Fair Spring reigns in his stead.Upon his throne she sits, the beggar maid —"Cophetua" is dead.

Winter Beauty

WHEN I go through the meadows brown,Where stand the tall weeds, sere and dead,Think you I find no beauty there,Since Summer through the fields has fled?The edges of the frozen stream,Whose quiet waters late were crossedBy shadows of the bending fern,Are fair with fringes of the frost.Wherever cowslips crowded thick,Or banks of buttercups would be,A host of airy forms in white,Like ghosts of flowers returned, I see.It may be clustered flakes of snow,Or frozen dew still glistening there,But still it seems as if there cameA rare, strange odor through the air.

October

ACROSS the stubble fields the lazy breezes pass,From Autumn orchards sloping southward in the sun,Where dropping from the low-hung branches, one by one,The apples hide in tangles of the wind-blown grass.A warm, sweet scent of mellow fruit fills all the air,And faintly over hills and hollows comes the cryOf some shrill bluejay, and his mate's far-off reply.Like Ruth, the winds will go a-gleaning, by and by,And garner in the leaves till all the woods are bare.But now my boyhood's love has come again to me,October – in her royal red and gold arrayed!She comes with glowing cheeks, my dusky Indian maid,And all the world seems bright because so bright is she.Unto her lips the wild grapes hold their spicy wine.Persimmons, sweet and golden with an early frost,Drop at her feet; and where the narrow creek has crossedThe woods, and in the ferns and flag its way has lost,Blood-red the corals of the dog-wood berries shine.And thus she comes, my Love I loved when I was young!We wander for a little while across the hills,And, as of old, her sunny presence warms and fillsMy heart. But like a lute with one string left unstrung,When I would sing again the song of other years,Something is lost. The harmony is incomplete.And though the same old melody I still repeat,One alto note of joy is gone that made it sweet,And something trembles in the Autumn haze like tears.

At Twilight

A    TINY bird flits through the twilight brown,When sunset dreams make all the garden fair,Whose soft notes fall into the quiet airLike olive leaves on waters smooth dropped down.Emblems of rest, when floods of care do cease,Into my heart, as well, they fall and float,An olive leaf each faint and dreamy note —I recognize their sign, and feel at peace.

The Prophet

DARKNESS and silence, such as only fallAt midnight, wrap the sleeping hamlets all;No life in all the dim world seems to be.Then suddenly,Across the hills, far off and faint, I hearSound through the dark, as through a dream, the call(How strange it seems!) of some bold chanticleer.(Half in my sleep I hear that clarion ring,With distant calls, like echoes, answering;And, as at war's alarum, soldiers leapFrom guarded sleepAnd seize their arms, and hasten from their tents,So, at this sound, my drowsy senses spring,Alert to man the mind's dark battlements.)To tell night's mid-hour tolls no startled bell;Only thy voice is heard, brave sentinel,Who, like the ancient watchman on the towers,Calls forth the hours,And to the wistful questioners, who seeNo gleam through pain's long vigil, dost foretell"The morning cometh," oft and cheerily.How canst thou know when, weary with his race,The Day turns back, his pathway to retrace?Canst thou the maiden Dawn's light footsteps hear,Approaching near?Or dost thou stand in converse with the skies,And know what time she leaves her hiding-placeBy joyful flashes of their starry eyes?Thou art a prophet, like to those of old,Who in the darkness sat, but firm and boldLooked with undaunted eyes towards the dimHorizon's rim,And thrilled with faith of waiting ages born,That soon from out the Night's strong prisonhold,Should burst the golden glory of the Morn.

The Potter's Field

JUST outside of the noisy town,Half through thicket and wood revealed,Hemmed about by a wall of stone,Wide it lieth, the Potter's Field.Brambles wander across the grass,Vines creep over the broken wall,Bindweeds blossom, and here and thereStands a waif of the forest tall.There no columns of gleaming whiteMark the dust that is sacred still;Swings the gate on its rusty hinge —All may enter and roam at will.Who should hinder the ruthless hand,Who protect from a vagrant's tread?Guard the urns of the rich and great —No one cares for the pauper dead!Outlawed felon and sinless childAll find room in the Potter's Field.There lies a Judas who sold his Lord,Here a Mary, His pity healed.Who could know of the shame and sinSafely under the sod concealed?Weary burdens of want and grief,Laid away in the Potter's Field.Who could guess? – for as swift and lightO'er it the feet of the seasons go;Summer hides it with grace of flowers,Winter spreads it with folds of snow.Rains weep over the lonely mound,Sunlight lingers, and swift shades pass;Tender hands of the gentle windSmooth the knots of the tangled grass.What though hallowed by Death alone,Rest unbroken the sod doth yield;Peace is here, for His constant watchGod doth set o'er the Potter's Field.

Left Out

WELL he knew that his clothes were poor:He was common, he humbly thought;Child as he was, he could understandWhy he was slighted and never sought.Yet could he help it, – his mother gone, —Help the weight of his father's shame?Hardest sentence of childish law:Blaming innocence not to blame.It was hard when the children playedAll together, to be left out, —Stand aside, with a stinging senseThat 'twas he that they laughed about.Thoughtless children, they felt no wrong, —Pushed him out of the ring at play.No one heard how his voice was choked,No one cared when he stole away.No one saw how he crept at lastThrough the gate and the grasses deep,Past the wall to a lonely graveWhere his mother was laid asleep.Could she feel in her narrow bed,Wee, cold hands, as they groped about —Feel the tears that were dropped becauseEven her grave had left him out?

"Our Father."

I HAVE no part with all the great, proud world:It cares not how I live, nor when I die;But every lily smiling in the field,And every tiny sparrow darting by,Claims kinship with me, mortal though they be, —The One who cares for them doth care for me.

A Madrigal

WOODBINETHE wild bee clings to itMost fond and long.The wild bird sings to itIts sweetest song.The wild breeze brings to itA life more strong.So all things lend to theeSome charm, some grace.The world's a friend to thee,In love's embrace.All hearts do bend to thee,In thy queen's place.

The Time o' Day

IF I should look for the time o' dayOn the rose's dial red,I would think it was just the sunrise hour,From the flush of its petals spread.And if I would tell by the lily-bell,I would think it was calm, white noon;And the violet's blue would tell by its hueOf the evening coming soon.But when I would know by my lady's face,I am all perplexed the while;For it's always starlight by her eyes,And sunlight by her smile.

Trailing Arbutus

THERE may be hearts that lie so deep'Neath griefs and cares that weigh like drifted snow,That love seems chilled in endless sleep,And budding hopes may never dare to grow.Yet under all, some memoryTrails its arbutus flowers of tender thought, —All buried in the snow maybe,Still with the sweetest fragrance fraught.

A Mood

SOMETHING has made the world so changed,Something is lost from field and sky,And the earth and sun are sadly estranged,And the songs of Nature seemed turned to a cry.Yet I heard my blithe little neighbor tellHow fair is the spring to see.Ah, well, —Perhaps the change is in me.Something has gone from your smile, sweetheart;Something I miss from your look, your tone.Though you stand quite near, we are still apart,You may clasp me close, but I feel alone.Yet over and over your love you tell,And as you say, it must be.Ah, well, —Perhaps the change is in me.

The Legend of the Pansies

ONE night in Fairyland, when all the courtHeld carnival to welcome in the June,And to the wind-harp's music, flying feetWere dancing on the rose leaves night had strewn;The naughty Puck crept up the castle stair,And called the sleeping princes from their bed;And with their royal pages following,Away the tricksy little fairies sped.Mounted on snowy night-moths, off they raced,Startling the gnomes, asleep within the shadeOf gloomy forests, with their merry cries,As at forbidden games all night they played.But when at sunrise blew an elfin horn,Mischievous Puck was nowhere to be seen,The disobedient princes stood forlorn;Like dew-drops fell their tears on grasses green.For fairy children, not within the boundsOf Queen Titania's realm at morning's dawn,Change into blooming flowers where they stand,And bloom there till the summer time is gone.Now, where the little princes played all nightIn robes of royal purple and of gold,The flowers we call pansies sprang in sight,And round them stood the little pages bold,In liveries of yellow, blue, and white;While upward through the east the great sun rolled.Then some, repentant, sadly drooped their heads;Some turned their saucy faces to the sky;But now they all alike must wait the dayWhen they can bid the summer time good-by.Sometimes, when bees upon their busy roundsStop to deliver some sweet message sentFrom Fairyland, the thoughtful faces smileAnd seem to grow a little more content.When cooling shadows creep along the grass,And mother birds are twittering lullabiesTo sleepy nestlings, then the south winds pass,And close with fingers soft the pansies' eyes.Upon the wings of dreams they're borne alongTo loving arms that rock them all the night,And fairy voices soothe their sleep with song,Till they are waked by kisses of the light.

The Tower of Babel

ONCE, many centuries ago,Men tried to build a tower so highThat rising upward, round on round,Its pinnacle should reach the sky.And as they toiled and built and dreamed and planned,What hopes went upward with the rising stone!That daring feet ere long should mount and standUpon the golden stairway to the throne.And then a dire confusion fellUpon the workers, building there.Men called and shouted each to eachWith strange, uncomprehended speech,And what it meant no one could tell;So they left building in despair.Yet in their hearts still lived the hope that theyMight scale the ramparts of the sky some day.Sometimes our souls expand and glowWith holy visions bright and pure;But when from these deep vales belowWe proudly try to climb and reachWith clumsy masonry of speech,And rounds of rhyme that shall endure,That sky-born thing, that heavenly theme,Touched only by a prayer or dream,A swift confusion o'er us flies,And sudden chills our hands benumb.Our minds are blurred, our tongues are dumb,The vision fades away and dies.Yet still we dream that song some day may beRung through the arches of Eternity.

The Old Bell

THE vines have grown so thick and twined so strong,With clinging hold, about the bell that swingsIn the old tower, that now it never rings.No one has heard its voice for seasons long.Sit by me on the broken belfry stair,And I will tell the simple tale to youOf those whose graves through yonder arch you view,Scattered about the churchyard, here and there.Ah me! How closely memory's tendrils twineAbout the heart, and choke the words that spring.It only throbs, the touch half-answering,Like this old bell, held speechless by the vine.

The Sea

FOREVER, like a heart that knows no peace,Like one who wanders weary to and froAbout the earth, but finds no resting-place,The sweeping tides of ocean ebb and flow.Like a discarded lover who entreatsFor favor still, and will not be denied,Up to the beach, with soft, caressing touchAnd tearful broken whispers, steals the tide.But still repulsed, it slow and sad withdraws,Yet at the dear one's feet its treasures lays,And turns again, to wail its sorrows outThrough all the hopeless nights and dreary days.

Married

IT is such a little whileFrom the time the fledgling triesTo tip from the edge of the nest to the bough,Then lifts its wings and flies.Till it sits in its own wee nest,Surprised out of growth or ken,And half-way feels that in some strange wayIt is learning to fly again.

Motherhood

FOR two dear heads of bronze and amber,For baby eyes of blue and brown,For two who cling, and kiss, and clamber,And on my shoulder nestle down.All little hearts are dearer to me,All little faces sweet and bright,All childish tears and woes undo me,And I would heal them all to-night.

Sufficiency

THE bird that sings one only strain,To tell his passion o'er and o'er,Can feel as much of joy or painAs if he knew a thousand more.And thou, sweet maid, whose gentle thoughtIn smiles or tears finds present vent,What feeling could thy soul be taught,Or who has words more eloquent?

Ophelia

CALM dost thou lie in wave-swept resting-place.No more the glances of the haughty DaneCan fill thy gentle breast with longing vain.The waves that stilled thy heart have drowned thy pain,And washed the sorrow from thy sweet, pale face,Ophelia.Thine be the violets, but his the rue.Though hope should sleep, and deep regret should wake,Thy clasped hand from Death's he could not take;The spell on those mute lips he could not break.What more with life and love hast thou to do,Ophelia?

Requiem

SLEEP, thou, whom Care so long oppressed.Care whispers by thy couch no more.Kind Death has shut the outer door;None can disturb thee, – sleep and rest.Thy hands are folded on thy breastThat throbs with Life's deep pain no more.Though Love waits grieving by thy door,He cannot enter, – sleep and rest.

Elizabeth

ELIZABETH,Thou comest a refreshing breathFrom meadows green, where morning stays,To those who bear the noon-tide blaze.Elizabeth,Thou couldst look in the eyes of Death,Undaunted, did he promise theeSome bright new scene of mirth or glee.I cannot think that time will grayThat sun-bright head, nor bear awayOne dimple in those rose-cheeks hid;Sure he were daring if he did.

Elinor

IN that shadow-land, where the Sisters threeAre weaving the web of destiny,There floated once through the fateful gloomA thread of sunshine, that gleamed uponThe thread of a life from the distaff drawn,And mingling, they passed to the busy loom.The wondering Parcea looked and smiled,As the light grew into the soul of a child,And in and out and through devious ways,They wove it in with the woof of days.But they said on earth (who knew not the Fates)"As the lily's chalice holds the dew,So in her heart, at the morning's gates,She caught the sunshine, when she came through."

On a Fly-Leaf of "Flute and Violin."

A    MASTER-HAND hath sweptLife's violin and flute.For him they laughed and weptWhen others found them mute.From his high altitudeHe catches, fine and clear,The notes that might eludeA less discerning ear.Transposing to a lower keyThe dream-song that he hears,He sets his heavenly melodyTo human smiles and tears.

Inspiration

THE singer walks by wood and rill,By town and stately river,And varied scenes his vision fill,And make his pulses quiver.But when his song comes borne acrossOn winds from dreamland blowing,We cannot tell what mystic touchHas set his chimes a-going.We hear the robins in his rhyme,We see the orchards driftedWith crests of bloom that glimmer whiteWhen mists of tears are lifted.A hundred tunes seem intertwinedTo mingle in his singing,When but a single rose, perhaps,Has set his fancy winging.

On a Fly-Leaf of Irving

WELCOME art thou, O singer!If thou dost know a songThat makes the long eve shorterBecause its joys are long.Welcome art thou, tale-bearer,If thou canst bear awayPart of the cares that burdenThe dull and dreary day.

On a Fly-Leaf of Riley's "Afterwhiles."

UNTO him alone who straysSometimes through the yesterdays,Lingering long in wood and field,Is the meaning all revealedOf these songs. Adown the rhymesRuns a path to bygone times;But 'tis found by those alone,Who the fresh green hills have known,And have felt the tender moodOf the country solitude;Who through lanes of pink peach bloomsUsed to see the lilac's plumesNodding welcome by the doorWhere the home-folks come no more.Blest the singer, then, who leadsBack again through clover meads,'Til old scenes we seem to see,Fair as once they used to be.Who can call from years long gone,Friends we trusted, leaned upon;For whose sake we learned to blessToilworn hands and homespun dress.As he sings of them, and thusWafts the pure air back to usOf the fields, there comes againChildhood's faith in God and man.