Summer's Passing

A SINGLE branch of flaming red,
A branch of tawny yellow
And every branch in gorgeousness
A rival of its fellow;
Some russet brown and faded green
With golden shadows in between
And mist-hid sun to mellow.

An instinct as of music near--
A breath the wind is bringing,
Broken and sweet, as from a host
Of swift and solemn winging--
A mystery born of light and sound
Wrapping our tranced progress round--
A sighing and a singing!

Thus in a certain lovely pomp
We leave the Summer lying--
These are her funeral banners, this
The pageantry of dying!
The music that we almost hear
Is wafted from her passing bier--
The singing and the sighing!

I Whispered To The Bobolink

I WHISPERED to the bobolink:
'Sweet singer of the field,
Teach me a song to reach a heart
In maiden armor steeled.'

'If there be such a song,' sang he,
'No bird can tell its mystery.'

I bent above the sweetest rose,
A deeper sweet to stir--
'O Rose,' I begged, 'what charm will wake
The deep, sweet heart of her?'

'Alas, poor lover,' sighed the rose,
'The charm you seek no flower knows.'

I wandered by the midnight lake
Where heaven lay confessed
'Tell me,' I cried, 'what draws the stars
To lie upon your breast?'

The silence woke to soft reply
'When Heaven stoops--demand not why!'

'Alas, sweet maid, love's potent charm
I cannot beg or buy,
I cannot wrest it from the wind
Or steal it from the sky--'

Breathless, I caught her whisper low,
'I love you--why, I do not know!'

Song Of The Sleeper

SLEEPER rest quietly
Deep underground!
Lord of your kingdom
Of murmurous sound.
Hear the grass growing
Sweet for the mowing;
Hear the stars sing
As they travel around--
Grass blade and star dust,
You, I, and all of us,
One with the cause of us,
Deep underground!

Murmur not, sleeper!
Yours is the key
To all things that were and
To all things that be--
While the lark's trilling,
While the grain's filling,
Laugh with the wind
At Life's Riddle-me-ree!
How you were born of it?
Why was the thorn of it?
Where the new morn of it?
Yours is the Key!

Sleep deeper, brother!
Sleep and forget
Red lips that trembled
Eyes that were wet--
Though love be weeping,
Turn to your sleeping,
Life has no giving
That death need regret.
Here at the end of all
Hear the Beginning call,
Life's but death's seneschal--
Sleep and forget!

THE breeze blows out from the land and it seeks the sea,
O and O! that my sail were set and away--
Fast and free on its wings would my sailing be
To the west: to the Tir Nan Og, where the blessed stay!

The darkness stirs, it awakes, it outspreads its arms,
O and O! and the birds in their nests are still,
The red-browed hill bleats low with the lamb's alarms,
And a sound of singing comes from the slipping rill.

My soul is awake alone, all alone in the earth,
O and O! and around is the lonely night.
As with the sun, would my soul go forth to its birth--
O'er the darkling sea, to the west--to the light, to the light!

Do they say, 'Be content with the land of the Innis Fail,
O and O! there is friendship here, there is song.'
But they smile to your face, when you turn they stammer and rail
And the song of the singer has tears and is over long!

A call comes out of the west and it calls a name,
O and O! it is soft, it is far, it is low--
Sweet, so sweet that it touches my soul with a flame
That burns the heart from my breast with the wish to go!

(Translated from the Celtic.)

'TELL me, Singer, of the way
Winding down to Arcady?
Of the world's roads I am weary--
You, with song so brave and cheery,
Happy troubadour must be
On the way to Arcady?'

Pausing on a muted note,
Song forsook the Singer's throat,
'Friend,' sighed he, 'you come too late,
Once I could the way relate,
Once--but long ago; Ah me,
Far away is Arcady!'

'Tell me, Poet, of the way
Winding down to Arcady?
Haunting is your verse and airy
With the grace and gleam of faery--
Dweller you must surely be
In the land of Arcady?'

Slow the Poet raised his eyes,
Sad were they as winter skies,
'Once, I sojourned there,' he said;
Then, no more--but with bent head
Whispered low, 'Ask not of me
That lost road to Arcady!'

Tell me, Lover, of the way
Winding down to Arcady?
Some sweet bourne your haste confesses--
Know you paths no other guesses?
Does your gaze, so far away,
See the road to Arcady?

In the Lover's eyes there gleamed
Radiance of all things dreamed--
'Nay, detain me not,' he cried
'I am hasting to my bride;
What have roads to do with me,
Love's at home in Arcady!'

SHE was my love and the pulse of my heart;
Lovely she was as the flowers that start
Straight to the sun from the earth's tender breast,
Sweet as the wind blowing out of the west--
Elana, Elana, my strong one, my white one,
Soft be the wind blowing over your rest!

She crept to my side
In the cold mist of morning.
'O wirra' she cried,
''Tis farewell now, mavourneen!
When the crescent moon hung
Like a scythe in the sky,
I heard in the silence
The Little Folks cry.

''Twas like a low sighing,
A sobbing, a singing;
It came from the west,
Where the low moon was swinging:
'Elana, Elana'
Was all of their crying.
Mavrone! I must go--
To refuse them, I dare not.
Alone I must go;
They have called and they care not--
Naught do they care that they call me apart
From the warmth and the light and the love of your heart.
Hark! How their singing
Comes winging, comes winging,
Through your close arms, beloved,
Straight to my heart!'

White grew her face as the thorn's tender bloom,
White as the mist from the valley of doom!
Swift was her going--her head on my breast
Drooped like a flower that winter has pressed--
Elana, Elana! My strong one, my white one!
Empty the arms that your beauty had blessed.

The Bridge Builder

OF old the Winds came romping down,
Oh, wild and free were they!
They bent the prairie grasses low
And made a place to play.

Then, that the gods might hear their voice
On purple days of spring,
They sought the tossing, pine-clad slope
And made a place to sing.

Tired at last of song and play,
They found a canyon deep
And in its echoing silences
They made a place to weep.

Man came, a small and feeble thing,
And looked upon the plain.
'Lo, this is mine,' he said, and set
A seal of golden grain.

Upon the mountain slopes he gazed,
Where the great pine trees grow,
Then gashed their mighty sides and laid
Their singing branches low.

He clung upon the canyon's ledge
And from its topmost ridge,
Above its vast and awful deeps,
He built himself a bridge.

A bauble in the light of day,
New gilded by the sun,
It seemed like some great, golden web
By giant spider spun!

The homeless winds came rushing down--
Oh they were wild and free!
And angry for their stolen plain
And for their felled pine tree--

And angry--angry most of all
For that brave bridge of gold!
With deep-mouthed shout they hurtled down
To tear it from its hold--

The girders shrieked, the cables strained
And shuddered at the roar--
Yet, when the winds had passed, the bridge
Held firmly as before!

Still fairy-like and frail it shone
Against the sunset's glow--
But one, the builder of the bridge,
Lay silent, far below!

The Passing Of Cadieux

THAT man is brave who at the nod of fate
Will lay his life a willing offering down,
That they who loved him may know length of days;
May stay awhile upon this pleasant earth
Drinking its gladness and its vigour in,
Though he himself lie silent evermore,
Dead to the gentle calling of the Spring,
Dead to the warmth of Summer; wrapt in dream
So deep, so far, that never dreamer yet
Has waked to tell his dream. Men there may be
Who, careless of its worth, toss life away,
A counter in some feverish game of chance,
Or, stranger yet, will sell it day by day
For toys to play with; but a man who knows
The love of life and holds it dear and good,
Prizing each moment, yet will let it go
That others still may keep the precious thing–
He is the truly brave!

This did Cadieux,
A man who loved the wild and held each day
A gift from Le Bon Dieu to fill with joy
And offer back again to Him who gave
(See, now, Messieurs, his grave!) We hold it dear
The story you have heard–but no? 'Tis strange,
For we all know the story of Cadieux!
He was a Frenchman born. One of an age
That glitters like a gem in history yet,
The Golden Age of France! 'Twould seem, Messieurs,
That every country has a Golden Age?
Ah well, ah well!–

But this Cadieux, he came
No one knew whence, nor cared, indeed, to know.
His simple coming seemed to bring the day,
So strong was he, so gallant and so gay–
A maker of sweet songs; with voice so clear
'Twas like the call of early-soaring bird
Hymning the sunrise; so at least 'twould seem
Mehwatta thought–the slim Algonquin girl
Whose shy black eyes the singer loved to praise.
She taught him all the soft full-throated words
With which the Indian-warriors woo their brides,
And he taught her the dainty phrase of France
And made her little songs of love, like this:

'Fresh is love in May
When the Spring is yearning,
Life is but a lay,
Love is quick in learning.

'Sweet is love in June:
All the roses blowing
Whisper 'neath the moon
Secrets for love's knowing.

'Sweet is love alway
When life burns to embers,
Hearts keep warm for aye
With what love remembers!'

Their wigwam rose beside the Calumet
Where the great waters thunder day and night
And dawn chased dawn away in gay content.
Then it so chanced, when many moons were spent,
The brave Cadieux and his brown brothers rose
To gather up their wealth of furs for trade;
And in that moment Fate upraised her hand
And, wantonly, loosed Death upon the trail,
Red death and terrible–the Iroquois!
(Oh, the long cry that rent the startled dawn!)
One way alone remained, if they would live–
The Calumet, the cataract–perchance
The good Saint Anne might help!

'In God's name, go!
Push off the great canoe, Mehwatta, go!–
Adieu, petite Mehwatta! Keep good cheer.
Say thou a prayer; beseech the good Saint Anne!–
For two must stay behind to hold the way,
And shall thy husband fail in time of need?
And would Mehwatta's eyes behold him shamed?–
Adieu!'–Oh, swift the waters bear them on!
Now the good God be merciful! ....

They stayed,
Cadieux and one Algonquin, and they played
With a bewildered foe, as children play,
Crying 'Lo, here am I!' and then 'Lo, here!' 'Lo, there!'
Their muskets spoke from everywhere at once–
So swift they ran behind the friendly trees,
They seemed a host with Death for General–
And the fierce foe fell back.

But ere they went
Their wingèd vengeance found the Algonquin's heart.
Cadieux was left alone!

Ah, now, brave soul,
Began the harder part! To wander through
The waking woods, stern hunger for a guide;
To see new life and know that he must die;
To hear the Spring and know she breathed 'Adieu'! ...
One wonders what strange songs the forest heard,
What poignant cry rose to the lonely skies
To die in music somewhere far above

Or fall in sweetness back upon the earth–
The requiem of that singer of sweet songs!
They found him–so–with cross upon his heart,
His cold hand fast upon this last Complaint–

'Ends the long trail–at sunset I must die!
I sing no more–O little bird, sing on
And flash bright wing against a brighter sky!

'Sing to my Dear, as once I used to sing;
Say that I guarded love and kept the faith–
Fly to her, little bird, on swifter wing.

'The world slips by, the sun drops down to-night–
Sweet Mary, comfort me, and let it be
Thy arms that hold me when I wake to light!'