Susan Coolidge
A Few More Verses
GIVING to all, thou gavest as well to me.
A myriad thirsty shores await the tide:
They drink and drink, and will not be denied;
But not a drop less full the brimming Sea.
One tiny shell among the kelp and weed,
One sand-grain where the beaches stretch away, —
How shall the tide regard them? Yet each day
It comes, and fills and satisfies their need.
What can the singing sands give to the Sea?
What the dumb shell, though inly it rejoice?
Only the echo of its own strong voice; —
And this is all that here I bring to thee.
A BENEDICTION
GOD give thee, love, thy heart’s desire!
What better can I pray?
For though love falter not, nor tire,
And stand on guard all day,
How little can it know or do,
How little can it say!
How hard it strives, and how in vain,
By hope and fear misled,
To make the pathway soft and plain
For the dear feet to tread,
To shield from sun-beat and from rain
The one beloved head!
Its wisdom is made foolishness;
Its best intent goes wrong;
It curses where it fain would bless,
Is weak instead of strong, —
Marring with sad, discordant sighs
The joyance of its song.
I do not dare to bless or ban, —
I am too blind to see, —
But this one little prayer I can
Put up to God for thee,
Because I know what fair, pure things
Thy inmost wishes be;
That what thy heart desires the most
Is what he loves to grant, —
The love that counteth not its cost
If any crave or want;
The presence of the Holy Ghost,
The soul’s inhabitant;
The wider vision of the mind;
The spirit bright with sun;
The temper like a fragrant wind,
Chilling and grieving none;
The quickened heart to know God’s will
And on his errands run;
The ministry of little things, —
Not counted mean or small
By that dear alchemy which brings
Some grain of gold from all;
The faith to wait as well as work,
Whatever may befall.
So, sure of thee, and unafraid,
I make my daily prayer,
Nor fear that my blind zeal be made
Thy injury or snare:
God give thee, love, thy heart’s desire,
And bless thee everywhere!
TO ARCITE AT THE WARS.
1759
A THOUSAND leagues of wind-blown space,
A thousand leagues of sea,
Half of the great earth’s hiding face
Divides mine eyes from thee;
The world is strong, the waves are wide,
But my good-will is stronger still,
My love, than wind or tide.
These sentinels which Fate has set
To bar and hold me here
I make my errand-men, to get
A message to thine ear.
The winds shall waft, the waters bear,
And spite of seas I, when I please,
Can reach thee everywhere.
Prayers are like birds to find the way;
Thoughts have a swifter flight;
And mine stream forth to thee all day,
Nor stop to rest by night.
Like silent angels at thy side
They stand unseen, they bend and lean,
They bless and warn and guide.
There is no near, there is no far,
There is no loss or change,
To love which, like a fixèd star,
Abideth in one range,
And shines, and shines, with quenchless eyes,
And sends long rays in many ways
To lighten distant skies.
Where sight is not, faith brighter burns;
So faithfully I wait,
Secure that loyal loving earns
Its guerdon soon or late, —
Secure, though lacking word or sign,
That thy true thought keeps as it ought
Tryst with each thought of mine.
NEW EVERY MORNING
EVERY day is a fresh beginning,
Every morn is the world made new.
You who are weary of sorrow and sinning,
Here is a beautiful hope for you, —
A hope for me and a hope for you.
All the past things are past and over;
The tasks are done and the tears are shed.
Yesterday’s errors let yesterday cover;
Yesterday’s wounds, which smarted and bled,
Are healed with the healing which night has shed.
Yesterday now is a part of forever,
Bound up in a sheaf, which God holds tight,
With glad days, and sad days, and bad days, which never
Shall visit us more with their bloom and their blight,
Their fulness of sunshine or sorrowful night.
Let them go, since we cannot re-live them,
Cannot undo and cannot atone;
God in his mercy receive, forgive them!
Only the new days are our own;
To-day is ours, and to-day alone.
Here are the skies all burnished brightly,
Here is the spent earth all re-born,
Here are the tired limbs springing lightly
To face the sun and to share with the morn
In the chrism of dew and the cool of dawn.
Every day is a fresh beginning;
Listen, my soul, to the glad refrain,
And, spite of old sorrow and older sinning,
And puzzles forecasted and possible pain,
Take heart with the day, and begin again.
LOHENGRIN
TO have touched Heaven and failed to enter in!
Ah, Elsa, prone upon the lonely shore,
Watching the swan-wings beat along the blue,
Watching the glimmer of the silver mail,
Like flash of foam, till all are lost to view, —
What may thy sorrow or thy watch avail?
He cometh nevermore.
All gone the new hope of thy yesterday, —
The tender gaze and strong, like dewy fire,
The gracious form with airs of Heaven bedight,
The love that warmed thy being like a sun: —
Thou hadst thy choice of noonday or of night;
Now the swart shadows gather, one by one,
To give thee thy desire!
To every life one heavenly chance befalls;
To every soul a moment, big with fate,
When, grown importunate with need and fear,
It cries for help, and lo! from close at hand,
The voice Celestial answers, “I am here!”
Oh, blessed souls, made wise to understand,
Made bravely glad to wait!
But thou, pale watcher on the lonely shore,
Where the surf thunders, and the foam-bells fly,
Is there no place for penitence and pain,
No saving grace in thy all-piteous rue?
Will the bright vision never come again?
Alas, the swan-wings vanish in the blue,
There cometh no reply!
A SINGLE STITCH
ONE stitch dropped as the weaver drove
His nimble shuttle to and fro,
In and out, beneath, above,
Till the pattern seemed to bud and grow
As if the fairies had helping been, —
One small stitch which could scarce be seen.
But the one stitch dropped pulled the next stitch out,
And a weak place grew in the fabric stout;
And the perfect pattern was marred for aye
By the one small stitch that was dropped that day.
One small life in God’s great plan,
How futile it seems as the ages roll,
Do what it may, or strive how it can
To alter the sweep of the infinite whole!
A single stitch in an endless web,
A drop in the ocean’s flow and ebb!
But the pattern is rent where the stitch is lost,
Or marred where the tangled threads have crossed;
And each life that fails of its true intent
Mars the perfect plan that its Master meant.
REPLY
“WHAT, then, is Love?” she said.
Love is a music, blent in curious key
Of jarring discords and of harmony;
’Tis a delicious draught which, as you sip,
Turns sometimes into poison on your lip.
It is a sunny sky infolding storm,
The fire to ruin or the fire to warm;
A garland of fresh roses fair to sight,
Which then becomes a chain and fetters tight.
It is a half-heard secret told to two,
A life-long puzzle or a guiding clew.
The joy of joys, the deepest pain of pain; —
All these Love has been and will be again.
“How may I know?” she said.
Thou mayest
not
know, for Love has conned the art
To blind the reason and befool the heart.
So subtle is he, not himself may guess
Whether he shall be more or shall be less;
Wrapped in a veil of many colored mists,
He flits disguisèd wheresoe’er he lists,
And for the moment is the thing he seems,
The child of vagrant hope and fairy dreams;
Sails like a rainbow bubble on the wind,
Now high, now low, before us or behind;
And only when our fingers grasp the prize,
Changes his form and swiftly vanishes.
“Then best not love,” she said.
Dear child, there is no better and no best;
Love comes not, bides not at thy slight behest.
As well might thy frail fingers seek to stay
The march of waves in yonder land-locked bay,
As stem the surging tide which ebbs and fills
Mid human energies and human wills.
The moon leads on the strong, resisting sea;
And so the moon of love shall beckon thee,
And at her bidding thou wilt leap and rise,
And follow o’er strange seas, ’neath unknown skies,
Unquestioning; to dash, or soon or late,
On sand or cruel crag, as is thy fate.
“Then woe is me!” she said.
Weep not; there is a harder, sadder thing, —
Never to know this sweetest suffering!
Never to see the sun, though suns may slay,
Or share the richer feast as others may.
Sooner the sealed and closely guarded wine
Shall seek again its purple clustered vine,
Sooner the attar be again the rose,
Than Love unlearn the secret that it knows!
Abide thy fate, whether for good or ill;
Fearlessly wait, and be thou certain still,
Whether as foe disguised or friendly guest
He comes, Love’s coming is of all things best.
TALITHA CUMI
OUR little one was sick, and the sickness pressed her sore.
We sat beside her bed, and we felt her hands and head,
And in our hearts we prayed this one prayer o’er and o’er:
“Come to us, Christ the Lord; utter thine old-time word,
‘Talitha cumi!’”
And as the night wore on, and the fever flamed more high,
And a new look burned and grew in the eyes of tender blue,
Still louder in our hearts uprose the voiceless cry,
“O Lord of love and might, say once again to-night,
‘Talitha cumi!’”
And then, and then – he came; we saw him not, but felt.
And he bent above the child, and she ceased to moan, and smiled;
And although we heard no sound, as around the bed we knelt,
Our souls were made aware of a mandate in the air,
“Talitha cumi!”
And as at dawn’s fair summons faded the morning star,
Holding the Lord’s hand close, the child we loved arose,
And with him took her way to a country far away;
And we would not call her dead, for it was his voice that said,
“Talitha cumi!”
THE BETTER WAY
WHO serves his country best?
Not he who, for a brief and stormy space,
Leads forth her armies to the fierce affray.
Short is the time of turmoil and unrest,
Long years of peace succeed it and replace:
There is a better way.
Who serves his country best?
Not he who guides her senates in debate,
And makes the laws which are her prop and stay;
Not he who wears the poet’s purple vest,
And sings her songs of love and grief and fate:
There is a better way.
He serves his country best,
Who joins the tide that lifts her nobly on;
For speech has myriad tongues for every day,
And song but one; and law within the breast
Is stronger than the graven law on stone:
There is a better way.
He serves his country best
Who lives pure life, and doeth righteous deed,
And walks straight paths, however others stray,
And leaves his sons as uttermost bequest
A stainless record which all men may read:
This is the better way.
No drop but serves the slowly lifting tide,
No dew but has an errand to some flower,
No smallest star but sheds some helpful ray,
And man by man, each giving to all the rest,
Makes the firm bulwark of the country’s power:
There is no better way.
FOREVER
THEY sat together in the sun,
And Youth and Hope stood hovering near;
Like dropping bell-notes one by one
Chimed the glad moments soft and clear;
And still amid their happy speech
The lovers whispered each to each,
“Forever!”
Youth spread his wings of rainbow light,
“Farewell!” he whispered as he went;
They heeded not nor mourned his flight,
Wrapped in their measureless content;
And still they smiled, and still was heard
The confidently uttered word,
“Forever!”
Hope stayed, her steadfast smile was sweet, —
Until the even-time she stayed;
Then with reluctant, noiseless feet
She stole into the solemn shade.
A graver shape moved gently by,
And bent, and murmured warningly,
“Forever!”
And then – where sat the two, sat one!
No voice spoke back, no glance replied.
Behind her, where she rested lone,
Hovered the spectre, solemn-eyed;
She met his look without a thrill,
And, smiling faintly, whispered still,
“Forever!”
Oh, sweet, sweet Youth! Oh, fading Hope!
Oh, eyes by tearful mists made blind!
Oh, hands which vainly reach and grope
For a familiar touch and kind!
Time pauseth for no lover’s kiss;
Love for its solace has but this, —
“Forever!”
MIRACLE
OH! not in strange portentous way
Christ’s miracles were wrought of old,
The common thing, the common clay,
He touched and tinctured, and straightway
It grew to glory manifold.
The barley loaves were daily bread,
Kneaded and mixed with usual skill;
No care was given, no spell was said,
But when the Lord had blessed, they fed
The multitude upon the hill.
The hemp was sown ’neath common sun,
Watered by common dews and rain,
Of which the fishers’ nets were spun;
Nothing was prophesied or done
To mark it from the other grain.
Coarse, brawny hands let down the net
When the Lord spake and ordered so;
They hauled the meshes, heavy-wet,
Just as in other days, and set
Their backs to labor, bending low;
But quivering, leaping from the lake
The marvellous, shining burdens rise
Until the laden meshes break,
And, all amazèd, no man spake,
But gazed with wonder in his eyes.
So still, dear Lord, in every place
Thou standest by the toiling folk
With love and pity in thy face,
And givest of thy help and grace
To those who meekly bear the yoke.
Not by strange sudden change and spell,
Baffling and darkening Nature’s face;
Thou takest the things we know so well
And buildest on them thy miracle, —
The heavenly on the commonplace.
The lives which seem so poor, so low,
The hearts which are so cramped and dull,
The baffled hopes, the impulse slow,
Thou takest, touchest all, and lo!
They blossom to the beautiful.
We need not wait for thunder-peal
Resounding from a mount of fire,
While round our daily paths we feel
Thy sweet love and thy power to heal,
Working in us thy full desire.
CHARLOTTE BRONTË
ORCHID, chance-sown among the moorland heather,
Scarce seen or tasted by the infrequent bee,
Set mid rough mountain growths, lashed by wild weather,
With none to foster thee.
We watch thee fronting all the blasts of heaven,
Thy slender rootlets grappled fast to rock,
Enduring from thy morning to thy even
The buffet and the shock.
Never thy sun vouchsafed a cloudless shining,
Never the wind was tempered to thy pain;
No cloud turned out for thee its silver lining,
No rainbow followed rain.
Nourished mid hardness, learning patience slowly
As hearts must do which know no other food,
Duty and Memory, companions holy,
Shared thy bleak solitude.
Cold touch of Memory, strong chill hand of Duty,
These held thee fast and ruled thee to the end,
Until, with smile mysterious in its beauty,
Came Death, rewarding friend.
Earth gave thee scanty cheer, but earth is ended,
Finished the years of thwarted sacrifice.
We see thee walking forward, well attended,
Led into Paradise!
Heaven is twice Heaven to one who, hungry-hearted,
Goes thither knowing no satisfaction here;
And when we thank the Lord for those departed
In this sure faith and fear,
We think of thee, lonely no more forever,
And tasting, while the eternal years unroll,
That joy of Heaven, which like a flowing river
Satisfies every soul.
END AND MEANS
WE spend our strength in labor day by day,
We find new strength replacing old alway;
And still we cheat ourselves, and still we say:
“No man would work except to win some prize;
We work to turn our hopes to certainties, —
For gold, or gear, or favor in men’s eyes.”
And all the while the goal toward which we strain —
Up hill and down, in sunshine and in rain,
Heedless of toil, if so we may attain —
Is but a lure, a heavenly-set decoy
To exercised endeavor, full employ
Of every power, which is man’s highest joy.
And work becomes the end, reward the means,
To woo us from our idleness and dreams;
And each is truly what the other seems.
So, Lord, with such poor service as we do,
Thy full salvation is our prize in view,
For which we long, and which we press unto.
Like a great star on which we fix our eyes,
It dazzles from the high, blue distances,
And seems to beckon and to say, “Arise!”
And we arise and follow the hard way,
Winning a little nearer day by day,
Our hearts going faster than our footsteps may;
And never guess the secret sweet device
Which lures us on and upward to the skies,
And makes each toil its own reward and prize.
To give our little selves to thee, to blend
Our weakness with thy strength, O Lord our Friend,
This is life’s truest privilege and end.
COMFORTED
THE last sweet flowers are dying,
The last green leaves are red;
The wild geese southward flying,
By law mysterious led,
Scream noisily o’erhead;
The honey-bees have hived them,
The butterflies have shrived them;
All hushed the song and twitter
And flutter of glad wing; —
How could we bear the autumn
If t’were not for the spring?
To see the summer banished,
Nor dare to bid her stay;
To mourn o’er beauty vanished
And joyance driven away;
To mark the shortening day;
To note the sad winds plaining,
The storm cloud and the raining;
To see the frost lance stabbing
Each faint and wounded thing; —
Oh, we should hate the autumn
Excepting for the spring!
To know that life is failing
And pulses beating slow;
To catch the unavailing
Sad monotones of woe
All the earth over go;
To know that snows must cover
The grave of friend and lover,
To hide them from the eyes and hands
That still caress and cling; —
The heart would break in autumn
If there were not a spring!
For every sleep a waking,
For every shade a sun,
A balm for each heart breaking,
A rest for labor done,
A life by death begun;
And so in wintry weather,
With smile and sigh together,
We look beyond the present pain,
The daily loss and sting,
And welcome in the autumn
For the sure hope of spring.
WORDS
A LITTLE, tender word,
Wrapped in a little rhyme,
Sent out upon the passing air,
As seeds are scattered everywhere
In the sweet summer-time.
A little, idle word,
Breathed in an idle hour;
Between two laughs that word was said,
Forgotten as soon as uttered,
And yet the word had power.
Away they sped, the words:
One, like a wingèd seed,
Lit on a soul which gave it room,
And straight began to bud and bloom
In lovely word and deed.
The other careless word,
Borne on an evil air,
Found a rich soil, and ripened fast
Its rank and poisonous growths, and cast
Fresh seeds to work elsewhere.
The speakers of the words
Passed by and marked, one day,
The fragrant blossoms dewy wet,
The baneful flowers thickly set
In clustering array.
And neither knew his word;
One smiled, and one did sigh.
“How strange and sad,” one said, “it is
People should do such things as this!
I’m glad it was not I.”
And, “What a wondrous word
To reach so far, so high!”
The other said, “What joy ’twould be
To send out words so helpfully!
I wish that it were I.”
INFLUENCE
COUCHED in the rocky lap of hills,
The lake’s blue waters gleam,
And thence in linked and measured rills
Down to the valley stream,
To rise again, led higher and higher,
And slake the city’s hot desire.
High as the lake’s bright ripples shine,
So high the water goes,
But not a drop that air-drawn line
Passes or overflows;
Though man may strive and man may woo,
The stream to its own law is true.
Vainly the lonely tarn its cup
Holds to the feeding skies;
Unless the source be lifted up,
The streamlet cannot rise:
By law inexorably blent,
Each is the other’s measurement.
Ah, lonely tarn! ah, striving rill!
So yearn these souls of ours,
An