Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward: Verses about Silence

It shall be as it hath been.
All the world is glad and green-
Hush! Ah, hush! There cannot be
April now for you and me.


Put your finger on the lips
Of your soul; the wild rain drips;
The wind goes diving down the sea;
Tell the wind, but tell not me.


Yet if I had aught to tell,
High as heaven, or deep as hell,
Bent the fates awry or fit,
I would find a word for it.


Oh, words that neither sea nor land
Can lift their ears to understand!
Wild words, as dumb as death or fear,
I dare to die, but not to hear!

Deep in the brooding shadow of thy wing,
Hidden and hushed and harbored here,
My soul for very stillness cannot sing;
A word would rend the silence, and a tear
Of joy affront the sense of cool and dark and rest.


Unto the music of thine endless calm
Sing thou then for me! Thy glad child
Sheltered and saved, wrapped all about from harm,
Happy to be helpless,-and thy child;
Can only turn and sleep within the blessed rest,


Can only drop the gifts which thou hast given
Back in thy lavish hand. O wealth
Of fulness! that for life, for love, for Heaven,
For thyself, thou shouldst thank thyself
In me; and leave me mute and motionless,-at rest.

'We're all for love,' the violins said.

-Sidney Lanier

Do I love you? Do I love you?
Ask the heavens that bend above you
To find language and to prove you
If they love the living sun.
Ask the burning, blinded meadows
If they love the falling shadows,
If they hold the happy shadows
When the fervid day is done.


Ask the blue-bells and the daisies,
Lost amid the hot field-mazes,
Lifting up their thirsty faces,
If they love the summer rains.
Ask the linnets and the plovers,
In the nest-life made for lovers,
Ask the bees and ask the clovers-
Will they tell you for your pains?


Do I, Darling, do I love you?
What, I pray, can that behoove you?
How in Love's name can I move you?
When for Love's sake I am dumb!
If I told you, if I told you,
Would that keep you, would that hold you,
Here at last where I enfold you?
If it would-Hush! Darling, come!

I

Dead, she drifted to his feet.
Tell us, Love, is Death so sweet?


Oh! the river floweth deep.
Fathoms deeper is her sleep.


Oh! the current driveth strong.
Wilder tides drive souls along.


Drifting, though he loved her not,
To the heart of Launcelot,


Let her pass; it is her place.
Death hath given her this grace.


Let her pass; she resteth well.
What her dreams are, who can tell?


Mute the steersman; why, if he
Speaketh not a word, should we?


II

Dead, she drifteth to his feet.
Close, her eyes keep secrets sweet.


Living, he had loved her well.
High as Heaven and deep as Hell.


Yet that voyage she stayeth not.
Wait you for her, Launcelot?


Oh! the river floweth fast.
Who is justified at last?


Locked her lips are. Hush! If she
Sayeth nothing, how should we?

One shadow glides from the dumb shore,
And one from every silent sail.
One cloud the averted heavens wear,
A soft mask, thin and frail.


Oh, silver is the lessening rain,
And yellow was the weary drouth.
The reef her warning finger puts
Upon the harbor's mouth.


Her thin, wan finger, stiff and stark,
She holds by night, she holds by day.
Ask, if you will. No answer makes
The sombre, guarded bay.


The fleet, with idle canvas hung,
Like a brute life, sleeps patiently.
The headlights nod across the cliff,
The fog blows out to sea.


There is no color on the tide,
No color on the helpless sky;
Across the beach,-a safe, small sound-
The grass-hid crickets cry.


And through the dusk I hear the keels
Of home-bound boats grate low and sweet.
O happy lights! O watching eyes!
Leap out the sound to greet.


O tender arms that meet and clasp!
Gather and cherish while ye may.
The morrow knoweth God. Ye know
Your own are yours to-day.


Forever from the Gloucester winds
The cries of hungry children start.
There breaks in every Gloucester wave
A widowed woman's heart.

The shadows watch about the house;
Silent as they, I come.
Oh, it is true that life is deaf,
And not that death is dumb.


The Christmas thrill is on the earth,
The stars throb in the sky.
Love listens in a thousand homes,-
The Christmas bells ring by.


I cross the old familiar door
And take the dear old chair.
You look with desolated eyes
Upon me sitting there.


You gaze and see not, though the tears
In gazing burn and start.
Believe, the living are the blind,
Not that the dead depart.


A year ago some words we said
Kept sacred 'twixt us twain,
'T is you, poor Love, who answer not,
The while I speak again.


I lean above you as before,
Faithful, my arms enfold.
Oh, could you know that life is numb,
Nor think that death is cold!


Senses of earth, how weak ye are!
Joys, joys of Heaven how strong!
Loves of the earth, how short and sad,
Of Heaven how glad and long!


Heart of my heart! if earth or Heaven
Had speech or language fine
Enough, or death or life could give
Me symbol, sound, or sign


To reach you-thought, or touch, or eye,
Body or soul-I 'd die
Again, to make you understand:
My darling! This is I!

Was there ever message sweeter
Than that one from Malvern Hill,
From a grim old fellow-you remember?
Dying in the dark at Malvern Hill.
With his rough face turned a little,
On a heap of scarlet sand,
They found him, just within the thicket,
With a picture in his hand,-


With a stained and crumpled picture
Of a woman's aged face;
Yet there seemed to leap a wild entreaty,
Young and living-tender-from the face
When they flashed the lantern on it,
Gilding all the purple shade,
And stooped to raise him softly,-
'That 's my mother, sir,' he said.


'Tell her'-but he wandered, slipping
Into tangled words and cries,-
Something about Mac and Hooker,
Something dropping through the cries
About the kitten by the fire,
And mother's cranberry-pies; and there
The words fell, and an utter
Silence brooded in the air.


Just as he was drifting from them,
Out into the dark, alone,
(Poor old mother, waiting for your message,
Waiting with the kitten, all alone!)
Through the hush his voice broke,-'Tell her-
Thank you, Doctor-when you can,
Tell her that I kissed her picture,
And wished I 'd been a better man.'


Ah, I wonder if the red feet
Of departed battle-hours
May not leave for us their searching
Message from those distant hours.
Sisters, daughters, mothers, think you,
Would your heroes now or then,
Dying, kiss your pictured faces,
Wishing they 'd been better men?

I saw the prettiest picture
Through a garden fence to-day,
Where the lilies look like angels
Just let out to play,
And the roses laugh to see them
All the sweet June day.


Through a hole behind the woodbine,
Just large enough to see
(By begging the lilies' pardon)
Without his seeing me,
My neighbor's boy, and Pharaoh,
The finest dog you'll see,


If you search from Maine to Georgia,
For a dog of kingly air,
And the tolerant, high-bred patience
The great St. Bernards wear,
And the sense of lofty courtesy
In breathing common air.


I called the child's name,-'Franko!'
Hands up to shield my eyes
From the jealous roses,-'Franko!'
A burst of bright surprise
Transfixed the little fellow
With wide, bewildered eyes.


'Franko!' Ah, the mystery!
Up and down, around,
Looks Franko, searching gravely
Sky and trees and ground,
Wise wrinkles on the eyebrows!
Studying the sound.


'O Franko!' Puzzled Franko!
The lilies will not tell;
The roses shake with laughter,
But keep the secret well;
The woodbine nods importantly.
'Who spoke?' cried Franko. 'Tell!'


The trees do not speak English;
The calm great sky is dumb;
The yard and street are silent;
The old board-fence is mum;
Pharaoh lifts his head, but, ah!
Pharaoh too is dumb.


Grave wrinkles on his eyebrows,
Hand upon his knee,
Head bared for close reflection,
Lighted curls blown free,-
The child's soul to the brute's soul
Goes out earnestly.


From the child's eyes to the brute's eyes,
And earnestly and slow,
The child's young voice falls on my ear
'Did you speak, Pharaoh?'
The bright thought growing on him,-
'Did you speak, Pharaoh?'


I can but think if Franko
Would teach us all his way
Of listening and trusting,-
The wise, wise Franko way!-
The world would learn some summer
To hear what dumb things say.

I dreamed that same old dream again last night;
You know I told you of it once, and more:
The sun had risen, and looked upon the sea,
And turned his head and looked upon the shore,
As if he never saw the world before.


What mystic, mythic season could it be?
It was October with the heart of May.
How count they time within love's calendar?
Dreaming or waking, I can only say
It was the morning of our wedding-day.


I only know I heard your happy step,
As I sat working on my wedding-day
Within my usual place, my usual task;
You came and took the pen, and laughing, 'Nay!'
You said, 'no more this morning! Come away!'


And I, who had been doing dreamily
Within my dream some fitful thing before,
(My pen and I were both too tired to stop,)
Drew breath,-dropped all my work upon the floor,
And let you lead me mutely to the door,


And out into a place I never saw,
Where little waves came shyly up and curled
Themselves about our feet; and far beyond
As eye could see, a mighty ocean swirled.
'We go,' you said, 'alone into the world.'


But yet we did not go, but sat and talked
Of usual things, and in our usual way;
And now and then I stopped myself to think,-
So hard it is for work-worn souls to play,-
Why, after all it is our wedding-day!


The fisher-folk came passing up and down,
Hither and thither, and the ships sailed by,
And busy women nodded cheerily;
And one from out a little cottage came,
With quiet porches, where the vines hung high,


And wished us joy, and 'When you're tired,' she said,
'I bid you welcome; come and rest with me.'
But she was busy like the rest, and left
Us only out of all the world to be
Idle and happy by the idle sea.


And there were colors cast upon the sea
Whose names I know not, and upon the land
The shapes of shadows that I never saw;
And faintly far I felt a strange moon stand,-
Yet still we sat there, hand in clinging hand,


And talked, and talked, and talked, as if it were
Our last long chance to speak, or you to me
Or I to you, for this world or the next;
And still the fisherwomen busily
Passed by, and still the ships sailed to the sea.


But by and by the sea, the earth, the sky,
Took on a sudden color that I knew;
And a wild wind arose and beat at them.
The fisherwomen turned a deadly hue,
And I, in terror, turned me unto you,


And wrung my wretched hands, and hid my face.
'O, now I know the reason, Love,' I said,
'We've talked, and talked, and talked the livelong day,
Like strangers, on the day that we were wed;
For I remember now that you were dead!'


I woke afraid: around the half-lit room
The broken darkness seemed to stir and creep;
I thought a spirit passed before my eyes;
The night had grown a thing too dread for sleep,
And human life a lot too sad to weep.


Beneath the moon, across the silent lawn,
The garden paths gleamed white,-a mighty cross
Cut through the shadowed flowers solemnly:
Like heavenly love escaped from earthly dross,
Or heavenly peace born out of earthly loss.


And wild my uncalmed heart went questioning it:
'Can that which never has been ever be?'
The solemn symbol told me not, but lay
As dumb before me as Eternity,
As dumb as you are when you look at me.

Of Guinevere from Arthur separate,
And separate from Launcelot and the world,
And shielded in the convent with her sin,
As one draws fast a veil upon a face
That 's marred, but only holds the scar more close
Against the burning brain-I read to-day
This legend; and if other yet than I
Have read, or said, how know I? for the text
Was written in the story we have learned,
Between the ashen lines, invisible,
In hieroglyphs that blazed and leaped like light
Unto the eyes. A thousand times we read;
A thousand turn the page and understand,
And think we know the record of a life,
When lo! if we will open once again
The awful volume, hid, mysterious,
Intent, there lies the unseen alphabet-
Re-reads the tale from breath to death, and spells
A living language that we never knew.


This that I read was one short song of hers,
A fragment, I interpret, or a lost
Faint prelude to another-missing too.
She sang it (says the text) one summer night,
After the vespers, when the Abbess passed
And blessed her; when the nuns were gone, and when
She, kneeling in her drowsy cell, had said
Her prayers (poor soul!), her sorrowful prayers, in which
She had besought the Lord, for His dear sake,
And love and pity of His Only Son,
To wash her of her stain, and make her fit
On summer nights, behind the convent bars
And on stone-floors, with bruisèd lips, to pray
Away all vision but repentance from
Her soul.


When, kneeling as she was, her limbs
Refused to bear her, and she fell afaint
From weariness and striving to become
A holy woman, all her splendid length
Upon the ground, and groveled there, aghast
That buried nature was not dead in her,
But lived, a rebel through her fair, fierce youth;
Aghast to find that claspèd hands would clench;
Aghast to feel that praying lips refused
Like saints to murmur on, but shrank
And quivered dumb. 'Alas! I cannot pray!'
Cried Guinevere. 'I cannot pray! I will
Not lie! God is an honest God, and I
Will be an honest sinner to his face.
Will it be wicked if I sing? Oh! let
Me sing a little, of I know not what;
Let me just sing, I know not why. For lips
Grow stiff with praying all the night.
Let me believe that I am happy, too.
A blessèd blessèd woman, who is fit
To sing because she did not sin; or else
That God forgot it for a little while
And does not mind me very much.
Dear Lord,'
(Said Guinevere), 'wilt thou not listen while
I sing, as well as while I pray? I shall
Feel safer so. For I have naught to say
God should not hear. The song comes as the prayer
Doth come. Thou listenest. I sing.'…


Purple the night, and high were the skies, and higher
The eyes that leaned like the stars of my soul, to me.
Whom loveth the Queen? Him who hath right to crown her.
Who but the King is he?


Sultry the day, and gold was the hair, and golden
The mist that blinded my soul away from me.
Dethroned for a dream, for a gleam, for a glance, for a color,
How could the crownèd be?


Life goeth by like a deed, nor returneth forever.
Death cometh on, fleet-footed as pity should be.
Hush! When she waketh at last and looketh about her,
Whom will a woman see?


Thus in her cell,
Deep in the summer night, sang Guinevere-
A little, broken, blind, sweet melody-
And then she kneeled upon the convent floor,
And, peaceful, finished all her prayer and slept;
For she had naught to say God might not hear.

Upon the city called the Friends'
The light of waking spring
Fell vivid as the shadow thrown
Far from the gleaming wing
Of a great golden bird, that fled
Before us loitering.


In hours before the spring, how light
The pulse of heaviest feet!
And quick the slowest hopes to stir
To measures fine and fleet.
And warm will grow the bitterest heart
To shelter fancies sweet.


Securely looks the city down
On her own fret and toil;
She hides a heart of perfect peace
Behind her veins' turmoil-
A breathing-space removed apart
From out their stir and soil.


Our reverent feet that golden day
Stood in a quiet place,
That held repressed-I know not what
Of such a poignant grace
As falls, if dumb with life untold,
Upon a human face.


To fashion silence into words
The softest, teach me how!
I know the place is Silence caught
A-dreaming, then and now.
I only know 't was blue above,
And it was green below.


And where the deepening sunshine found
And held a holy mood,
Lowly and old, of outline quaint,
In mingled brick and wood,
Clasped in the arms of ivy vines
A nestling cottage stood:


A thing so hidden and so fair,
So pure that it would seem
Hewn out of nothing earthlier
Than a young poet's dream,
Of nothing sadder than the lights
That through the ivies gleam.


'Tell me,' I said, while shrill the birds
Sang through the garden space,
To her who guided me-'tell me
The story of the place.'
She lifted, in her Quaker cap,
A peaceful, puzzled face,


Surveyed me with an aged, calm,
And unpoetic eye;
And peacefully, but puzzled half,
Half tolerant, made reply:
'The people come to see that house-
Indeed, I know not why,


'Except thee know the poem there-
'T was written long since, yet
His name who wrote it, now-in fact-
I cannot seem to get-
His name who wrote that poetry
I always do forget.


'Hers was Evangeline; and here
In sound of Christ Church bells
She found her lover in this house,
Or so I 've heard folks tell.
But most I know is, that 's her name,
And his was Gabriel.


'I 've heard she found him dying, in
The room behind that door,
(One of the Friends' old almshouses,
Perhaps thee 've heard before
Perhaps thee 've heard about her all
That I can tell, and more.


'Thee can believe she found him here,
If thee do so incline.
Folks have their fashions in belief-
That may be one of thine.
I'm sure his name was Gabriel,
And hers Evangeline.'


She turned her to her common work
And unpoetic ways,
Nor knew the rare, sweet note she struck
Resounding to your praise,
O Poet of our common nights,
And of our care-worn days!


Translator of our golden mood,
And of our leaden hour!
Immortal thus shall poet gauge
The horizon of his power.
Wear in your crown of laurel leaves,
The little ivy flower!


And happy be the singer called
To such a lofty lot!
And ever blessed be the heart
Hid in the simple spot
Where Evangeline was loved and wept,
And Longfellow forgot.


O striving soul! strive quietly,
Whate'er thou art or dost,
Sweetest the strain, when in the song
The singer has been lost;
Truest the work, when 't is the deed,
Not doer, counts for most!


The shadow of the golden wing
Grew deep where'er it fell.
The heart it brooded over will
Remember long and well
Full many a subtle thing, too sweet
Or else too sad to tell.


Forever fall the light of spring
Fair as that day it fell,
Where Evangeline, led by your voice,
O solemn Christ Church bell!
For lovers of all springs, all climes,
At last found Gabriel.

prologue


Who shall tell the story
As it was?
Write it with the heart's blood?
(Pale ink, alas!)
Speak it with the soul's lips,
Or be dumb?
Tell me, singers fled, and
Song to come!


No answer; like a shell the silence curls,
And far within it leans a whisper out,
Breathless and inarticulate, and whirls
And dies as dies an ailing dread or doubt.


And I-since there is found none else than I,
No stronger, sweeter voice than mine, to tell
This tale of love that cannot stoop to die-
Were fain to be the whisper in the shell;


Were fain to lose and spend myself within
The sacred silence of one mighty heart,
And leaning from it, hidden there, to win
Some finer ear that, listening, bends apart.


'Fly for your lives!' The entrails of the earth
Trembled, resounding to the cry,
That, like a chasing ghost, around the mine
Crept ghastly: 'The pit 's on fire! Fly!'


The shaft, a poisoned throat whose breath was death,
Like hell itself grown sick of sin,
Hurled up the men; haggard and terrible;
Leaping upon us through the din


That all our voices made; and back we shrank
From them as from the starting dead;
Recoiling, shrieked, but knew not why we shrieked;
And cried, but knew not what we said.


And still that awful mouth did toss them up:
'The last is safe! The last is sound!'
We sobbed to see them where they sunk and crawled,
Like beaten hounds, upon the ground.


Some sat with lolling, idiot head, and laughed;
One reached to clutch the air away
His gasping lips refused; some cursed; and one
Knelt down-but he was old-to pray.


We huddled there together all that night,
Women and men from the wild Town;
I heard a shrill voice cry, 'We all are up,
But some-ye have forgot-are down!'


'Who is forgot?' We stared from face to face;
But answering through the dark, she said
(It was a woman): 'Eh, ye need not fret;
None is forgot except the dead.


'The buried dead asleep there in the works-
Eh, Lord! It must be hot below!
Ye'll keep 'em waking all the livelong night,
To set the mine a-burning so!'


And all the night the mine did burn and burst,
As if the earth were but a shell
Through which a child had thrust a finger-touch,
And, peal on dreadful peal, the bell,


The miner's 'larum, wrenched the quaking air;
And through the flaring light we saw
The solid forehead of the eternal hill
Take on a human look of awe;


As if it were a living thing, that spoke
And flung some protest to the sky,
As if it were a dying thing that saw,
But could not tell, a mystery.


The bells ran ringing by us all that night.
The bells ceased jangling with the morn.
About the blackened works,-sunk, tossed, and rent,-
We gathered in the foreign dawn;


Women and men, with eyes askance and strange,
Fearing, we knew not what, to see.
Against the hollowed jaws of the torn hill,
Why creep the miners silently?


From man to man, a whisper chills: 'See, see,
The sunken shaft of Thirty-one!
The earth, a traitor to her trust, has fled
And turned the dead unto the sun.


'And here-O God of life and death! Thy work,
Thine only, this!' With foreheads bare,
We knelt, and drew him, young and beautiful,
Thirty years dead, into the air.


Thus had he perished; buried from the day;
By the swift poison caught and slain;
By the kind poison unmarred, rendered fair
Back to the upper earth again-


The warm and breathing earth that knew him not;
And men and women wept to see-
For kindred had he none among us all-
How lonely even the dead may be.


We wept, I say; we wept who knew him not;
But sharp, a tearless woman sprang
From out the crowd (that quavering voice I knew),
And terrible her cry outrang:


'I pass, I pass ye all! Make way! Stand back!
Mine is the place ye yield,' she said.
'He was my lover once-my own, my own;
Oh, he was mine, and he is dead!'


Women and men, we gave her royal way;
Proud as young joy the smile she had.
We knew her for a neighbor in the Town,
Unmated, solitary, sad.


Youth, hope, and love, we gave her silent way,
Calm as a sigh she swept us all;
Then swiftly, as a word leans to a thought,
We saw her lean to him, and fall


Upon the happy body of the dead-
An aged woman, poor and gray.
Bright as the day, immortal as young Love,
And glorious as life, he lay.


Her shrunken hands caressed his rounded cheek,
Her white locks on his golden hair
Fell sadly. 'O love!' she cried with shriveled lips,
'O love, my love, my own, my fair!


'See, I am old, and all my heart is gray.
They say the dead are aye forgot-
There, there, my sweet! I whisper, leaning low,
That all these women hear it not.


'Deep in the darkness there, didst think on me?
High in the heavens, have ye been true?
Since I was young, and since you called me fair,
I never loved a man but you.


And here, my boy, you lie, so safe, so still'-
But there she hushed; and in the dim,
Cool morning, timid as a bride, but calm
As a glad mother, gathered him


Unto her heart. And all the people then,
Women and men, and children too,
Crept back, and back, and back, and on,
Still as the morning shadows do.


And left them in the lifting dawn-they two,
On her sad breast, his shining head
Stirred softly, as were he the living one,
And she had been the moveless dead.


And yet we crept on, back, and back, and on.
The distance widened like the sky,
Between our little restlessness,
And Love so godlike that it could not die.

Of Peter's daughter, it is said, men told,
While yet she breathed, a tale as sad as life,
As sweet as death; which, now she sleeps, has lent
The borrower Time its lighter tints, and holds
Only the shadowed outline of a grief
Before our eyes.
Thus much remains. She lived,
Yet lived not; breathed, yet stifled; ate, but starved;
The ears of life she had, but heard not; eyes,
But saw not; hands, but handled neither bud
Nor fruit of joy: for the great word of God,
In some dim crevice of eternal thought
Which he called Petronilla, had gone forth
Against her-for her-call it what we may,
And, bending to his will unerringly,
As bends the golden feather of the grain
Before the footsteps of the mailed west-wind,
Since childhood she had lain upon her bed
In peace and pain, nor had ever raised her body
Once to its young lithe length, to view the dawn
Of all her young lithe years, nor had once laid
Her little feverish feet upon the face
Of the cool, mocking, steadfast floor which laughed
When other girls, with other thinking done
Some time in Heaven about their happy names,-
Set like a song about their happy names,-
Tripped on it like a trill.
As one may see
Upon the hushed lips of a Sabbath-day
A church door sliding softly as a smile,
To let the solemn summer sunshine in
To dream upon, but neither guess nor tell
The dusky week-day secrets which the dome
Whispers the darkened niches and the nave,
Where in the purple silence which they love
The marble angels sleep, or weep, or sing,
(Who knoweth what they do on Monday mornings?)
So slides the tale on Petronilla, left
Upon a certain dull, wan day alone,
Her face turned on her pillow to the room
Wherein the wise and faithful met (for faith
With wisdom married then; none forbid the banns
Within the temple of the hearts of men),
To break their bread with Peter, and discourse
Of all the sacred, secret things; the hopes,
The fears, the solemn ecstasies, and dreams,
And deeds, which held life in the arms of death,
For the first namers of the name of Christ.
And lying there, at rest, adream, asleep,
She scarce could tell her state, so dim it was,
Such lifeless reflex of the hueless day,
A voice struck Petronilla,-Peter's voice,
Solemn and mighty as a lonely wave
Upon an untrod shore. 'O brethren, hark!
Ye know not what ye say; your minds are dark.
O ye of little faith, I show you then!
By his great power I show you. Watch with me,
For he is here. Abase your heads; he lives;
It is his will I do his will, and show
The power of God in that he once hath lived
And died, but lives to work his glory still,-
To work his wish, unargued, undisturbed,
Without resistance or appeal or blame,
Upon the creature which his hands have made.
Were it his choice to raise yon maiden now
From out the coffin of her bed, and bid
Her step,-or live; it means the same,-what then?
Is that too much for him to do? What now?
Is that too hard? Increase your faith! Behold!'


Awake, asleep, adream, or all, or none,
What ailéd Petronilla? The world spun
Like a frail spindle in a woman's hands.
And all her breath went from her, and her sight,
At the faint fancy of her father, still,
Alone, alight within the room; as solemn
And sad and glad as had a vision been
Of a choice taper set to spend itself,
And blaze and waste upon an altar's brow,
Not taught nor knowing wherefore,-burning out,
Since that 's a taper's nature, and enough.
And faint the fancy of his face, if his
It were. And faint the fancy of his voice,
Which lost its way, so Petronilla thought,
Or twice or thrice, before it bridged the bit
Of fanciful, faint sunlight which crawled in
Between his pitying, awful face and hers,
And 'Petronilla,' sighing softly, said,
And 'Petronilla!' ringing cried, 'Arise!
'Now, in the name of Christ who lived for thee,
I bid thee live, and rise, and walk!'
Erect,
Unaided, with a step of steel, she rose.
What should she do but rise? And walked; how else?
For God had said it, sent it, dropped it down,
The sweetest, faintest fancy of her life.
And fancying faintly how her feet dropped far
Below the dizzy dancing of her eyes,
Adown the listening floor; and fancying
How all the rising winds crept mutely up
The court, and put their arms around her neck
For joy; and how for joy the sun broke through
The visor which the envious day had held
Across his happy face, and kissed her hair;
And fancying faintly how those men shrank back,
And pulled their great gray beards at sight of her,
And nodded, as becometh holy men,
Approvingly, at wonders, as indeed
They 'd bade her walk themselves,-so musingly,
As she had been a fancy of herself,
She found herself live, warm and young, within
The borders of the live, warm world.
But still,
As faintly as a fancy fell the voice
Of Peter: 'Serve us, daughter, at the board.'
And dimly as a fancy served she them,
And sweetly as a fancy to and fro
Across the gold net of the lightening day
She passed and paused.
Caught in its meshes fast;
Tangled into the happy afternoon,
Tangled into the sense of life and youth,
Blind with the sense of motion, leap of health,
And wilderness of undiscovered joy,
Stood Petronilla. Down from out her hand
A little platter dropped, and down upon
Her hands her face dropped, broken like the ware
Of earth that sprinkled all the startled floor,
And down upon her knees her face and hands
Fell, clinging to each other; crouching there
At Peter's feet,-her father's feet,-she gave
One little, little longing cry,-no more;
And like the fancy of a cry,-so faint;
And like the angel of a cry,-so brave.
For Peter's face had lifted like the heavens,
Above the presence of the holy men,
Above the maiden serving in the sun,
Above-God help him!-God's own princely gift,
The pity which a father bears his child.
And far and calm as heaven is shone his smile,
And far and still as heaven is fell his voice,
Yet held a cadence like a prisoned pain,
As one twice-wrecked upon the same bare shore.
'The Lord hath chosen Petronilla. Hearken!
Whom he will choose, he chooseth: some to honor,
Some to dishonor; this to be and bear,
And that to dare and do; these bear his swords,
And these his chains. Nay, but, O man! what then?
Who art thou that shalt mould the mood of God,
Or search his meaning, or defy his will?
On Petronilla he will work his power.
O, what is Petronilla? What am I?
Nay, nay, my child, I tremble; this is wrong.
Thou moanest; that is strange, for he is here
To show his glory on thy young, bent head,
And little smile and hands. O, lift them up
Before him, while I speak the word he sent.
For, by the love of him who died for thee,
Commandment comes; and I must bid thee turn
And lay thee down upon thy patient bed
Again; for what am I, and what art thou?
So turn and lay thee down. Behold it, Lord!
'T is finished, Master! Petronilla, go.
God's hand is on thee, O my child; God's grace
Go with thee. Brethren, see! His will is done,
And shall be done upon us evermore.'
And there the wonder fell, so runs the tale;
For Petronilla turned her dumb as death,
And laid her down upon her empty bed,
Where a long sunbeam warm as life had curled;
And crept within it, white as sifted snow,
Nor ever raised her slender length again,
Nor ever dropped her foot upon the floor,
Nor ever felt the winds from up the court
Weave arms about her neck; nor ever found
Herself entangled more within the gold
Warp of the moving, merry world; nor once
Again knew even the pallid happiness
Which comes of serving holy men; nor felt
The leap of life within her shrivelled veins.
And there the legend breaks: what good or ill
Struck arms or folded wings about the heart
Of Petronilla; how fared she, prisoned
Behind the bars of that untragic woe,
The bearing of an old familiar fate
From which long use has rubbed the gilding out,
To which the wonted hours have set themselves
So sorely they can neither smile nor sigh
To think of it, but only drop the lids
Across their leaden eyes for wondering
What a glad chance an unworn grief must be;
What solemn musings marshalled in his mind
Who was the Rock on which Christ built a church
Of such as love nor son nor daughter more
Than him,-we know not; rude our guesses are,
And rough; and mar the shady, sacred hush
Which the raised fingers of the years enforce.


The story slips,-an echo like the voice
Of far-off, falling water yet unseen;
A puzzle, like our next-door neighbor's life;
A lesson which an angel on the wing
Might drop, but linger not to read to us,
Or mark the stint. Each heart steals forth alone
A little after twilight, and takes home
The leaf, the line, appointed unto it.