Madison Julius Cawein: Verses about Rain

The rain made ruin of the rose and frayed
The lily into tatters: now the Morn
Looks from the hopeless East with eyes forlorn,
As from her attic looks a dull-eyed maid.
The coreopsis drips; the sunflowers fade;
The garden reeks with rain: beneath the thorn
The toadstools crowd their rims where, dim of horn,
The slow snail slimes the grasses gaunt and greyed.
Like some pale nun, in penitential weeds,
Weary with weeping, telling sad her beads,
Her rosary of pods of hollyhocks,
September comes, heavy of heart and head,
While in her path the draggled four-o'-clocks
Droop all their flowers, saying, 'Summer's dead.'

Sodden and shivering, in mud and rain,
Half in the light that serves but to reveal
The blackness of an alley and the reel
Homeward of wretchedness in tattered train,
A boy stands crouched; big drops of drizzle drain
Slow from a rag that was a hat: no steel
Is harder than his look, that seems to feel
More than his small life's share of woe and pain.
The pack of papers, huddled by his arm,
Is pulp; and still he hugs the worthless lot....
A door flares open to let out a curse
And drag him in out of the night and storm.
Out of the night, you say? You know not what!
To blacker night, God knows! and hell, or worse!

Old Man Rain at the windowpane
Knocks and fumbles and knocks again:
His long-nailed fingers slip and strain:
Old Man Rain at the windowpane
Knocks all night but knocks in vain.
Old Man Rain.

Old Man Rain at the windowpane
Reels and shambles along the lane:
His old gray whiskers drip and drain:
Old Man Rain with fuddled brain
Reels and staggers like one insane.
Old Man Rain.

Old Man Rain is back again,
With old Mis' Wind at the windowpane,
Dancing there with her tattered train:
Her old shawl flaps as she whirls again
In the wildman dance and is torn in twain.
Old Mis' Wind and Old Man Rain.

Wild clouds roll up, slag-dark and slaty gray,
And in the oaks the sere wind sobs and sighs,
Weird as a word a man before he dies
Mutters beneath his breath yet fears to say:
The rain drives down; and by each forest way
Each dead leaf drips, and murmurings arise
As of fantastic footsteps, one who flies,
Whispering, the dim eidolon of the day.

Now is the wood a place where phantoms house:
Around each tree wan ghosts of flowers crowd,
And spectres of sweet weeds that once were fair,
Rustling; and through the bleakness of bare boughs
A voice is heard, now low, now stormy loud,
As if the ghosts of all the leaves were there.

Around, the stillness deepened; then the grain
Went wild with wind; and every briery lane
Was swept with dust; and then, tempestuous black,
Hillward the tempest heaved a monster back,
That on the thunder leaned as on a cane;
And on huge shoulders bore a cloudy pack,
That gullied gold from many a lightning-crack:
One big drop splashed and wrinkled down the pane,
And then field, hill, and wood were lost in rain.

At last, through clouds,-as from a cavern hewn.
Into night's heart,-the sun burst angry roon;
And every cedar, with its weight of wet,
Against the sunset's fiery splendor set,
Frightened to beauty, seemed with rubies strewn:
Then in drenched gardens, like sweet phantoms met,
Dim odors rose of pink and mignonette;
And in the east a confidence, that soon
Grew to the calm assurance of the moon.

Sometimes, when I'm gone to-bed,
And it's all dark in the room,
Seems I hear somebody tread
Heavy, rustling through the gloom:
And then something there goes 'boom,'
Stumbling on the floor o'erhead;
And I cover eyes and ears:
Never dare to once look out,
But just cry till mother hears,
Says there's naught to cry about:
'Old Mis' Wind is at her capers.
Shut your eyes and go to sleep.
She has got among those papers,
In the attic, with her sweep.
Shut your eyes and go to sleep.'

II.

Sometimes when the lamplight's flame
Flickers, fingers tap the pane;
Knuckled fingers, just the same,
Rapping with long nails again:
Bony hands then seem to strain,
Pulling at the window-frame:
And I cry, 'Who's there?' And then
Sit bolt up in bed and call
Till my father drops his pen,
Saying to me from the hall:
'Old Man Rain is at his nonsense.
Close your eyes and go to sleep.
Makes a lot of noise. My conscience!
What a fuss his fingers keep!
Close your eyes and go to sleep.'

BEFORE the rain, low in the obscure east,
Weak and morose the moon hung, sickly gray;
Around its disc the storm mists, cracked and creased,
Wove an enormous web, wherein it lay
Like some white spider hungry for its prey.
Vindictive looked the scowling firmament,
In which each star, that flashed a dagger ray,
Seemed filled with malice of some dark intent.
The marsh-frog croaked; and underneath the stone
The peevish cricket raised a creaking cry.

Within the world these sounds were heard alone,
Save when the ruffian wind swept from the sky,
Making each tree like some sad spirit sigh;
Or shook the clumsy beetle from its weed,
That, in the drowsy darkness, bungling by,
Sharded the silence with its feverish speed.

Slowly the tempest gathered. Hours passed
Before was heard the thunder's sullen drum
Rumbling night's hollow; and the Earth at last,
Restless with waiting,-like a woman, dumb
With doubting of the love that should have clomb
Her casement hours ago,--avowed again,
'Mid protestations, joy that he had come.
And all night long I heard the Heavens explain.

The night has set her outposts there
Of wind and rain;
And to and fro, with ragged hair,
At intervals they search the pane.

The fir-trees, creepers redly climb,
That seem to bleed,
Like old conspirators in crime,
Drip, whispering of some desperate deed.

'Tis as if wild skirts, flying fast,
Besieged the house;
The wittol grass, bent to the blast,
Whines as if witches held carouse.

And now dark feet steal to the door
And tap and tip,
Shuffle, and then go on once more
The eaves keep a persistent drip.

And then a skurry, and a bound;
Wild feet again?
A wind-wrenched tree that to the ground
Sweeps instantly its weight of rain.

What is it, finger on its lip,
That up and down
Treads, with dark raiment all a-drip,
Trailing a tattered leaf of gown?

'O father, I am frightened! See!
There, at the pane!'
'Hush! hush! my child, 'tis but a tree
That tosses in the wind and rain.'

A rumble, as it were, of hoofs,
And hollow call:
'O father, what rolls on the roofs,
That sounds like some dark funeral?'

'Hush! hush! my child; it is the storm
The autumn wind.'
'But, father, see! what is that form?
There! wild against the window-blind.'

'It is the firelight in the room.'
The father sighed.
And then the child:''Twas dark as doom,
And had the face of her who died.'

The hillside smokes
With trailing mist around the rosy oaks;
While sunset builds
A gorgeous Asia in the west she gilds.
Auroral streaks
Sword through the heavens' Himalayan peaks:
In which, behold,
Burn mines of Indian ruby and of gold.
A moment and
A shadow stalks between it and the land.
A mist, a breath,
A premonition, with the face of death,
Turning to frost
The air it breathes, like some invisible ghost.
Then, wild of hair,
Demons seem streaming to their fiery lair:
A chasm, the same
That splits the clouds' face with a leer of flame.
The wind comes up
And fills the hollow land as wine a cup.
Around and round
It skips the dead leaves o'er the forest's ground.
A myriad fays
And imps seem dancing down the withered ways.
And far and near
It makes of every bush a whisperer;
Telling dark tales
Of things that happened in the ghostly vales:
Of things the fox
Barks at and sees among the haunted rocks:
At which the owl
Hoots, and the wolf-hound cringes with a growl.
Now on the road
It walks like feet too weary for their load.
Shuffling the leaves,
With stormy sighs, onward it plods and heaves;
Till in the hills
Among the red death there itself it kills.
And with its death
Earth, so its seems, draws in a mighty breath.
And, like a clown
Who wanders lost upon a haunted down,
Turns towards the east,
Fearful of coming goblin or of beast,
And sees a light,
The jack-o'-lantern moon, glow into sight..

I

Can freckled August,-drowsing warm and blond
Beside a wheat-shock in the white-topped mead,
In her hot hair the yellow daisies wound,-
O bird of rain, lend aught but sleepy heed
To thee? when no plumed weed, no feathered seed
Blows by her; and no ripple breaks the pond,
That gleams like flint within its rim of grasses,
Through which the dragonfly forever passes
Like splintered diamond.

II

Drouth weights the trees; and from the farmhouse eaves
The locust, pulse-beat of the summer day,
Throbs; and the lane, that shambles under leaves
Limp with the heat-a league of rutty way-
Is lost in dust; and sultry scents of hay
Breathe from the panting meadows heaped with sheaves-
Now, now, O bird, what hint is there of rain,
In thirsty meadow or on burning plain,
That thy keen eye perceives?

III

But thou art right. Thou prophesiest true.
For hardly hast thou ceased thy forecasting,
When, up the western fierceness of scorched blue,
Great water-carrier winds their buckets bring
Brimming with freshness. How their dippers ring
And flash and rumble! lavishing large dew
On corn and forest land, that, streaming wet,
Their hilly backs against the downpour set,
Like giants, loom in view.

IV

The butterfly, safe under leaf and flower,
Has found a roof, knowing how true thou art;
The bumblebee, within the last half-hour,
Has ceased to hug the honey to its heart;
While in the barnyard, under shed and cart,
Brood-hens have housed.-But I, who scorned thy power,
Barometer of birds,-like August there,-
Beneath a beech, dripping from foot to hair,
Like some drenched truant, cower.

Tattered, in ragged raiment of the rain,
The Night arrives. Outside the window there
He stands and, streaming, taps upon the pane;
Or, crouching down beside the cellar-stair,
Letting his hat-brim drain,
Mutters, black-gazing through his trickling hair.

Then on the roof with cautious feet he treads,
Whispering a word into the windy flues;.
And all the house, huddling itsflowerbeds,
Looks, dark of face, as if it heard strange news,
Hugging the musky heads
Of all its roses to its sides of ooze.

Now in the garden, with a glowworm lamp,
Night searches, letting his black mantle pour;
Treading the poppies down with heavy tramp,
Thudding the apple, sodden to its core,
Into the dripping damp,
From boughs the wet loads, dragging more and more.

Then at the barn he fumbles, gropes his way,
Through splashing pools; and, seeping, enters in
The stalls and creeps among the bedding hay,
Burying him moistly to his clammy chin,
While near him, brown and gray,
The dozing cattle make a drowsy din.

The martin-box, poled high above the gate,
He pushes till the fluttering fledglings wake,
Wondering what bird it is that comes so late:
Then to the henhouse door he gives a shake;
Or, like a thief await,
Leans listening softly with black heart aquake.

Then with his ragged cloak flung back he goes,
With flickering lantern, where the stream o'erflowed,
Breathing wet scents of wayside weed and.rose,
And guttural music of the frog and toad;
A firefly-light, that glows,
Green in his hand to guide him on his road.

And doffing then, upon the wooded hill,
His hat of cloud, a little while he stands,
Hearkening in silence to the leaping rill;
Then, stooping low, he lifts in azure hands
A great gold daffodil
The moon and pins it in his cloak's blown bands.

When on the leaves the rain persists,
And every gust brings showers down;
When all the woodland smokes with mists,
I take the old road out of town
Into the hills through which it twists.

I find the vale where catnip grows,
Where boneset blooms, with moisture bowed;
The vale through which the red creek flows,
Turbid with hill-washed clay, and loud
As some wild horn a hunter blows.

Around the root the beetle glides,
A living beryl; and the ant,
Large, agate-red, a garnet, slides
Beneath the rock; and every plant
Is roof for some frail thing that hides.

Like knots against the trunks of trees
The lichen-colored moths are pressed;
And, wedged in hollow blooms, the bees
Seem clots of pollen; in its nest
The wasp has crawled and lies at ease.

The locust harsh, that sharply saws
The silence of the summer noon;
The katydid that thinly draws
Its fine file o'er the bars of moon;
And grasshopper that drills each pause:

The mantis, long-clawed, furtive, lean
Fierce feline of the insect hordes
And dragonfly, gauze-winged and green,
Beneath the wild-grape's leaves and gourd's,
Have housed themselves and rest unseen.

The butterfly and forest-bird
Are huddled on the same gnarled bough,
From which, like some rain-voweled word
That dampness hoarsely utters now,
The tree-toad's voice is vaguely heard.

I crouch and listen; and again
The woods are filled with phantom forms
With shapes, grotesque in mystic train,
That rise and reach to me cool arms
Of mist; the wandering wraiths of rain.

I see them come; fantastic, fair;
Chill, mushroom-colored: sky and earth
Grow ghostly with their floating hair
And trailing limbs, that have their birth.
In wetness fungi of the air.

O wraiths of rain! O ghosts of mist!
Still fold me, hold me, and pursue!
Still let my lips by yours be kissed!
Still draw me with your hands of dew
Unto the tryst, the dripping tryst.

Behold the blossom-bosomed Day again,
With all the star-white Hours in her train,
Laughs out of pearl-lights through a golden ray,
That, leaning on the woodland wildness, blends
A sprinkled amber with the showers that lay
Their oblong emeralds on the leafy ends.
Behold her bend with maiden-braided brows
Above the wildflower, sidewise with its strain
Of dewy happiness, to kiss again
Each drop to death; or, under rainy boughs,
With fingers, fragrant as the woodland rain,
Gather the sparkles from the sycamore,
To set within each core
Of crimson roses girdling her hips,
Where each bud dreams and drips.

Smoothing her blue-black hair,-where many a tusk
Of iris flashes,-like the falchions' sheen
Of Faery 'round blue banners of its Queen,-
Is it a Naiad singing in the dusk,
That haunts the spring, where all the moss is musk
With footsteps of the flowers on the banks?
Or just a wild-bird voluble with thanks?

Balm for each blade of grass: the Hours prepare
A festival each weed's invited to.
Each bee is drunken with the honied air:
And all the air is eloquent with blue.
The wet hay glitters, and the harvester
Tinkles his scythe,-as twinkling as the dew,-
That shall not spare
Blossom or brier in its sweeping path;
And, ere it cut one swath,
Rings them they die, and tells them to prepare.

What is the spice that haunts each glen and glade?
A Dryad's lips, who slumbers in the shade?
A Faun, who lets the heavy ivy-wreath
Slip to his thigh as, reaching up, he pulls
The chestnut blossoms in whole bosomfuls?
A sylvan Spirit, whose sweet mouth doth breathe
Her viewless presence near us, unafraid?
Or troops of ghosts of blooms, that whitely wade
The brook? whose wisdom knows no other song
Than that the bird sings where it builds beneath
The wild-rose and sits singing all day long.

Oh, let me sit with silence for a space,
A little while forgetting that fierce part
Of man that struggles in the toiling mart;
Where God can look into my heart's own heart
From unsoiled heights made amiable with grace;
And where the sermons that the old oaks keep
Can steal into me.-And what better then
Than, turning to the moss a quiet face,
To fall asleep? a little while to sleep
And dream of wiser worlds and wiser men.