Some Verses

DEAR DEAD WOMEN

 
The winds have chilled the loving odorous South,
All wan and grey she seeks a place to die,
Her tossing hair, her pleading passionate mouth,
Pity that things so fair in death must lie;
But Winter holds and kills her with a sigh.
One kiss he lays upon her lips so proud,
Shuts the blue eyes and winds her sombre shroud.
 
 
I walk between the narrow way of yew.
The glowing amaranth droops upon its stalk,
The shivering birds are timorous and few,
And waifs of Summer strew th' untended walk;
With vague sweet forms I seem to pass and talk.
The ladies of those days in Summer's prime
Whose smiles prevailed not for the frown of Time.
 
 
Their little tripping feet reluctant turned
Down the dark paths they had not known before;
Behind them all the glow of living burned,
But they must enter thro' the gloomy door,
And leave behind the loves that plead no more,
The dear frivolity of wiles and ways
They neither need nor know in these grim days.
 
 
Here in their garden's close I spend no tear,
No smile—too rare the heights for such display.
But on the frosted hedges' lifted spear
And with my head a little bowed, I lay
A pale camelia, proud and cold as they
Who wait beneath their ashen pall of snow—
Perhaps the fair dead dames will see and know.
 

THE GRAVE OF HOPE

 
There's a wild little gnome in the wood
Who sings as he digs a grave
Of Hope that soars and Hope that flies
And Hope that singes her wings, and lies
In peace where the willows wave.
 
 
And he croons in the pauses of toil,
A shivering song of Fears,
The lean black shades of Hope so fair
Who weave her nets with her golden hair
And harry her down the years.
 
 
And he knows she will perish at last,
He has carved her name on the stone
While the trees draw near and forget to sleep,
And the little leaves bend their heads and weep,
For Hope that must die alone.
 

TREES OF THE WILDERNESS

 
The great bleak trees stand up against the sky
Lifting their naked arms in ceaseless prayer
To the unpitying heavens, that they might die,
Rather than drag their weary lives out there.
 
 
Thro' starless nights the untold hours wear on,
All awful phantom shapes affright the wood—
And morning light but brings th' unwinking sun,
To torture with its glare their solitude.
 
 
In those grim wilds no sweet-voiced bird will sing,
No flowers will bloom within those trackless lands,
Nor is there trace of any living thing,
Save those gaunt giants, holding up their hands.
 
 
And when they fall, still round the unknown spot
Howls the rough wind, till in the common ground
They end the life which is—and yet is not,—
A riddle where no meaning shall be found.
 

THE LOVE OF THE ROSE

 
Trilled forth the Nightingale
In sweetest sleep of day—
Unto his love, the rose,
Ah golden heart, unclose!
For love, my fairest rose, will last for aye.
 
 
So, thro' the waning night
She learned to wear her crown;
Yielded her heart's sweet strife
And found that love was life
Set to the time the dear bird lilted down.
 
 
But when the morning came
The red sun burned above;
Hid are the night birds all,
Flower petals fade and fall;
The rose is dead—and what became of love!
 

IN THE GREEN YEW

 
The wind is howling in angry pain,
Ah me, and I cannot rest;
On such a night home is best,
Why does she stand in the same old place
With the smile of smiles on her cold white face
And call me thro' the rain?
 
 
Ah—the Wind has died from the Fear of her smile—
And I creep quite still—
On over the hill,
To where she stands 'mid the scented yew
And where I now am standing too,
And she sees me all the while.
 
 
A little green snake curls thro' her hair—
The scent of the yew is strong and sweet—
Her eyes have drawn me to her feet,
And I lie along on the drenching ground
And worship—and watch the snake curl round,
His tongue shoots thro' the air.
 
 
Now—slowly she takes her eyes from me,
And I dream and wait,
Till in shades of hate
My love of her smile has faded quite
And I spring to kill her, there in the night—
But only the yew I see.
 

THE DEAD NIGHT

 
The strong brave Night is dead. Its endless deeps
Of patient tenderness, the moon-bright still
When every silver lake and purple hill
Hold wise unfathomed converse with the steeps
Of starry heaven, are past. All nature weeps
And draws the veiling grey of morning mist
Upon the lips that Night's last clouds have kist—
The Night that watched so well the world who sleeps.
The Night is dead—Alas—and pallid Day
is but the corpse laid out in cold array,
The white sad emblem of the heart we knew.
Through half-closed lids the eyes shine palely blue;
The gleaming grave clothes cover all the rest.
So cruel still lies now the air's sweet breast
And trees and hills fold down calm hands and eyes,
That none may guess their secret mysteries.