In his previous novel "Succession" after a break of 50 years from his 's award winning "Vangel Griffin," the main character faces the business challenge of downsizing a corporate, has suspicions about his wife's affections, worries over his financial situation, and jousts with an unpredictable boss. There is no high drama of life-and-death, alien forces, lurid sexual scenario, or political or sociological views nor undercurrent. Readily relating to a credible, recognizable character in multiple, interrelated real-life situations, the reader follows how he juggles these with alternating creeping unsettling feelings, humor, resignation, affection, wit, loyalty, determination, idealism, sheer blind movement, and a type of courage--the way most persons get through things living their lives.
In "Winterside's Wanderyear," unable to feel at ease in civilian life after serving in the Korean War, the main character Jude Winterside leaves everything including his wife and job as a lawyer to go live in Spain seeking a drastic change of circumstances he believes will allay his uneasiness. The foreign locale and also the harsh dictatorship of Franco beckon to him as he carries the wartime trauma he cannot shake in the routines of the conventional American culture of the period. Intending to be at the fringe where he can mostly observe Spanish society to give him the stimulation but also the relaxation he seeks, Wanderyear nonetheless becomes closer to the precariousness and dangers of the Franco dictatorship.
He becomes involved in a romantic relationship with the beautiful Satry Cordero. Through this relationship, he inevitably becomes associated with Satry's rebel brother Alonso secretly plotting to overthrow the Franco regime. Winterside also cannot escape the everyday violence of Spanish society such as brawls breaking out in cafes and the hostile tone of many he encounters under the thumb of dictatorship. Near the ending, Winterside foolishly, but humanely tries to save Alonso as he leads a violent demonstration against Franco's Falangists Spanish fascists.
First there are brickbats and stones, then gunfire breaks out. The novel is a closely-observed portrayal of 's Spanish society with a variety of engaging fully-drawn characters. In the Herbert Lobsenz style now seen in three novels with others to come, the reader follows the story to see how things turn out for the characters. The reader becomes interested because of the identifiable characters and situations. Comic scenes, romantic interludes, brisk dialogue, growing threats to some, and the building violent political conflict reflecting actual circumstances and events hold the reader in the hands of this outstanding novelist.
What reviewers have said about Lobsenz's earlier novels. A distinctive, almost uncomfortable realism permeates every page. Kaya rated it it was amazing Nov 22, Linda marked it as to-read Feb 11, Cindy Gates marked it as to-read Feb 12, Nicole marked it as to-read Feb 12, Barry marked it as to-read Feb 12, Pam marked it as to-read Feb 13, Jared marked it as to-read Feb 14, Kim Coomey marked it as to-read Feb 15, Carole marked it as to-read Feb 15, Robert Piacquad marked it as to-read Feb 16, Alejandra Lopez marked it as to-read Feb 16, Sue marked it as to-read Feb 20, Arwen S marked it as to-read Feb 20, Leanne Holmes marked it as to-read Feb 21, Ruth Hobbs marked it as to-read Feb 23, Joyce marked it as to-read Feb 25, Dan Cashin marked it as to-read Feb 28, Sandi Widner marked it as to-read Mar 02, Tasha marked it as to-read Mar 03, Jeremy Mcdermott marked it as to-read Mar 05, Missy Nelson marked it as to-read Mar 06, Diana marked it as to-read Mar 07, Miranda marked it as to-read Mar 08, Zandt McCue marked it as to-read Mar 08, Kathy marked it as to-read Mar 08, Morgan Eckstein marked it as to-read Mar 08, Patrick Pham marked it as to-read Mar 09, Michele marked it as to-read Mar 09, Kathryn marked it as to-read Mar 09, Jason Almstead marked it as to-read Mar 10, There are no discussion topics on this book yet.
Call me thy foe in thy passion; claim me in peace for thy friend; Yet bethink thee by lowland and upland, wherever thou wiliest to wend, I am thine Angel of Judgment; mine eyes thou must meet in the end. The passion of the hurricane on its iron rocks is nursed, Veering winds of huge desire that thwart the plunging barque. Pale witch-fires glisten on the wave and beacon from the shore, And shipwrecked voices bid beware of gramarye ac- curst.
Cape of Good Hope! We seek it far across the waters dark, But Cabo Tormentoso the sailors named it first. By this wild cape the mariners go to their spicerie, Weather-wasted mariners with dreaming, dreaming eyes. Behind them toss the sullen leagues of monster-haunted sea; Before them, oh, before them lift the breathing groves of mace, Nard and clove and cinnamon, where fragrance never dies, Where amber balsam drips from the flame-shaped In- cense Tree.
Year in, year out, the reckless sailor-race Throw scorn upon your tempests for a waft of spicerie. From eastern flush to western flame Without a strife or dream he came. Beauty had called, and he was mute, Yet myriad beauty would not cease, Until he threw away his lute, Because it chided peace. About him on the tufted moss Lay the spent bearers of the cross, And reapers faint from harvest stress. He envied them their weariness. Though chants, intoned in fragrant air, Rose from the woodland hermitage, He had no sin to passion prayer, Nor any thirst to assuage.
He puzzled all the seraphim Sent to lament or laurel him, For his shield undinted was and fair, Yet the sunset would not dazzle there. A song Reft of its music, and a scentless rose. Except the heart outsoar the hand, the throng Will bless thee little for thy labor-throes. The dream without the deed? Dawn's fairy gold, Paled, ere it wake the hills, to misty gray. When like a new-lit star Sprang thy soul from the mist, On the brooding hills afar — Hadst thou but wist!
What though on turf and moss Soft was my footing set, With cedar-shade across? No forest-waft went by without its thrill and threat. More wouldst thou prize the goad Than the balm, Imperious stress of storm than citron-scented calm. Still while, faithless of doom, Revel was thine and sleep, Over briar and bloom, Smooth and steep, On to our destined hour I swept as sea-winds sweep.
Look not to me for grace, Draw and smite, Nor dare one prayer save this: May God defend the right! The baffled longing that, one weary day, Upon a wind of sighs was blown away, A feathered seed, pursued by greedy ravens, The watchful birds that make our hopes their prey, [65] Found lodgment there and in the stillness grew A cedar tree whose summit pricks the blue, Whose level shadow cherishes a gracious Sequestered space of greenery and dew. The solid earth is false and cheats our eyes With Druid mist and magical disguise.
Only our Dreamland, holy and veracious, Beyond the pillars of the rainbow lies. Who dreamed to lift to God a perfect fane Sculptured one deathless pillar ere he died. The world's great highway takes no heed of it, Though paths wind thither through the April green. The earth's blind forces feel no need of it ; Yet was there shaped, before the shaping hours, A subtle league and sympathy between This rhythmic tree and all effectual powers.
Yet undeterred by baffled speech and thought, The heart stakes all upon thy hidden face. The caryen walnut of the balconies, The browns and crimsons of the volumed shelves On every side revealing mellow tints, The chandeliers in azure draperies, The colored pennons on their leaning staffs, The long, green tables, and the careless chairs, Glad faces framed in gold, majestic busts Whiter than white beneath the crismal dawn, The windows lucent 'tween their polished bars, The gleaming panels and the glittering shields, All quietly reclaimed from melting dusk Their lines and lustres, waxing bright as if The spirits of the dead glowed through the books And shed a shining down their festal hall.
Here the laurelled brotherhood, Like the stars in primal dance, Shall praise what God found good, With golden iterance; And the sages from east and west, And the prophets of burning lip, Shall welcome us to the test Of their great fellowship. Here shall be garnered the fruit Of the mystical cosmic tree That gropes with its craving root Where the waters of wisdom be; And the burden of hearts that broke Neath the oracles too sublime, And lore of the nameless folk, The treasure-trove of time. Here shall clarion voices call The crescent soul to joy, And hands of healing fall On feverish annoy; Visions shall come and go On the dreaming eyes of youth, And here shall her chosen know The countenance of Truth.
Not Dante, though in ruddiest altar-flame He plunged his torch, and bore it through the shame Of deepening hell to domes of starry fire,. Not that sire Of glorious chant, our Milton, he who came With solemn tread and vestments purged from blame To swing the censer of divine desire. But Horace, sipping at your crystal spring As lightly as he quaffed his Sabine wine, Caught up that lute, about whose golden string The rose and myrtle he was deft to twine, And sweetly sang, in pauses of the feast: Was not the poet's hydromel By many a drop of bitterness profaned?
Doth no autumnal disenchantment dwell In that calm wisdom by his eld attained? Ah, but this laureate of England's prime, This golden-throat, drank joy from deeper springs Than penury's pursuing wolves could grime Or winter frost beneath enshadowing wings.
Winterside's Wanderyear
Till bird and blossom and the sunbeam sin, What angel shall contest your aureoles? Full well we knew his choristers, Whose plaintive voices haunt our rest, Those sable-vested harbingers Of melancholy guest. We smiled on him for love of these, With eyes that swift grew dim to scan Beneath the veil of courteous ease The faith-forsaken man. Yet loyal to his own despair, Erect beneath a darkened sky, He deems the austerest truth more fair Than any gracious lie; And stands, heroic, patient, sage, With hopeless hands that bind the sheaf, Claiming God's work without His wage, The bard of unbelief.
TO SHELLEY HEARING the autumnal wind, I muse on thee, O Shelley, bird of most aerial note, Whose songs came pulsing from a kindred throat, As passionate, impetuous and free, As sudden-shrill with visionary glee, And hoarse with human agonies which smote Thy gentlest heart till it would fain devote Its music unto man's captivity, Singing the day when wrath and pride and fear, With the spectral troop of their unholy kind, Shall melt in love, as shadows disappear Before the sun ; to evil unresigned, Urging the nobler discontent I hear In all these restless voices of the wind.
The summer comes again, by vale and hill With blossoms fashioning her fragrant way ; But thou, the child of summer, to the day Art long unknown, and all thy steps are still. Hence the summers will Seek thee in vain. The eye that watched the cloud Hath locked its sight beneath the fallen lid ; The ear that heard the skylark's note is vowed To a perpetual quiet. Thou art hid Beyond the summers, and thy name belongs But to a ceaseless melody of songs. On whose fine strings the nymph Parnassus-bred Played ever most melodiously, is rent, And all the music fled. Alas, our torch of truth!
Alas, the sweet pure life, that ripened still To holier thought and more benignant grace, Hath spread its wings, and who is left to fill The dear and empty place?
How poor thou art, O bleak Atlantic coast! How barren all thy hills, my mother-land! Of that bright group who sang amid thy wheat, And cheered thy reapers lest their brown arms tire, Whom ermined Europe raised a hand to greet, As princes of the lyre, The first have fallen, and the others wait, The snow of years on each beloved head, With weary feet before the sunset gate That opens toward the Dead. And who abides to sing away our pain, As these our bards we carry to their rest? We need thy comfort for the tears that rain, O poet, on thy breast. It is our earth, where prophet steps grow few, For which we weep, and not, O harper gray, For thee, who caroled from the morning dew To noontide of the day, Nor left thy task when twilight down the wall Stole silently in shadowy flakes and bars, And whose clear tones, while night enfolded all, Sang on beneath the stars.
The knights and dames had bent their heads to list, The serving-maids were hearkening from the stair, And little childish faces, mother-kissed, Had flocked about thy chair, [75] When ceased thy fingers in the strings to weave, O'er thine anointed sight the eyelids fell; And thou wert sleeping, who from dawn to eve Hadst wrought so wondrous well. O gentle minstrel, may thy rest be deep And tranquil, as thy working-tide was long. Our lonely hearts will grudge thee not thy sleep, Who grudged us not thy song. It was only to slip her free Of the vestal raiment worn O'er the lengthening lily lea Toward the west, For a robe more lustrous white By the sunset spirits borne From mansions jewel-bright Of her rest.
It was little for her to pass From this storm-sea, well sufficed With celestial sea of glass, Sea of sky ; To change the dream and the spur For the truth, the goal, the Christ. Oh, but it was for her Much to die.
DO they hold converse, keen as wine Under the pavement, they Who make, in truth, the royal line Of England, kings by right divine, Crowned with the bay? Yet one is lonely in that great, Rejoicing fellowship, — Lonely with Chaucer for a mate, And Spenser, Dreamland's laureate. He hears the drip Of Florence dews upon a mound That golden tides of spring Mantle with bloom, the angel-sound Of nightingales that all around Her silence sing. On those dazzling stretches of sand The sick fell into a chafe, For their thoughts sought home to the land Of shadow and rain. Our ghost he was lean at the best, And his kingship keen for the wine, But Ophelia's taffeta vest Bore blazon of tar and brine.
Tressed she her sailor hair With weed from the ocean floor, And tuned on that savage air Old snatches of Elsinore. By the clear of the moon we played, Till the lads un fretted their brows, Comforted as with the shade Of beeches, where red kine drowse In the English lanes. All the angels praised, But in the shelter of their wings confessed One to another that the tricksy sport, Frenzies and furies and the shock of fray, Perplexed their white, serene intelligence. The highest ranks of the redeemed stood dazed, But half remembering their mortality, Rapture of love, pain's fierce reality, In those far aeons ere earth flamed away.
Only the hardly-saved, the devil-torn, The ruddy fringe of that ethereal court, Saints by the hairsbreadth, felt their lashes wet, Sobbed out and shook when stormy Lear went crazed, Threw asphodels to Rosalind, grew tense With Hamlet's terror and, at end, their bliss Sweeter within them for the taste of this, Surprised their harpstrings with a gold acclaim, A paean for that misty English morn While yet Time dwelt with Space, when softly came The miracle, — when, an unheeded name, Shakespeare was born.
Like men benumbed who spread their hands Against a cordial flame, We clustered to that burning soul. Our spirits, sick and dim, Touched his vesture and were whole, Such virtue flowed from him. Our words fell faintly on his ears, For in a druid mist He moved 'mid mortal hopes and fears To some diviner tryst. Hearkening through the human press To a far, ethereal tone, He made the crowd his wilderness, Surrounded and alone.
Does dim old Merlin follow yet the Gleam? Do climbers still, forget all mortal ills, Even the lapsing of life's little stream? The waves and billows have gone over thee ; Thy precious things have fed the insatiate brine. Still on the heights thy changeless beacons shine Above the furthest reaches of the sea, Thine altar-glow invincibly divine. The meads and valleys ring with viol and lute, With harp and dulcimer and soft citole ; The music leaps from blossoming knoll to knoll; But on the naked peak the dreams are mute, And undistinguishable song from soul.
WHAT is the spirit? Nay, We know not — star in clay.
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We know not, yet we trust The dream within the dust. We trust not, yet we hark The song within the dark. All mortal deeds go by As cloudlets down the sky. We are our longing. Thus Let Love remember us. IV When like a flaming scroll Earth shrivels, if the soul Should those fierce heats outwear, What of ourselves were there? A longing bruised and dim, A seed of seraphim.
Sublimely inconvincible, - When earth his claim denies, When flint and thorn his foot repel, He arrogates the skies. Thou know'st how oft the heart is faint for fear To lose thy trace amid the eddying throng, How oft the dewdrop neighbors with the tear On moss and heather where the foot went wrong. Ah, how may darkness comprehend the light, And how should I, enmeshed and clouded so In multitudinous error, view aright Thy radiant visage and its glory know? For subtile filaments of falsehood blight The pattern fair whereto my deeds would grow, And still their fruits are bitter in despite Of all this groping of the roots below.
Well might my quest despair of thee, shouldst thou Despair of it, but still my haunted days, By each mysterious leafage of the bough, And ashes blanched by the escaping blaze, By lure of singing waves before the prow, And sunset runes in sard and chrysoprase, Awake the bosom Sphinx, renew the vow, And once again illume the wistful gaze. For even here thy beams encompass me, Tortured and solaced by the happy pain To feel the effulgence that I may not see Divinely fret the shadow and the stain. For childhood, rosy glow Of blithe, adventurous blood.
For youth, the throe And ecstasy of passion masterless. For manhood and for womanhood, the stress Of long day-labor, till, forwearied so, With quiet eyes we watch the shadows grow. Tears for the dead and dark forgetfulness. These are thy gifts, O Life! And each in its appointed hour is best, Yet incomplete and worse than incomplete, A mock, a horror, save indeed thou be What saints have trusted and what sages guessed, The veiled angel Immortality.
AVALON THE rosary of life holds many days, And some are pearl and coral, gold are some, Enchanted opal, heavenly chrysoprase, But on the fatal thread anon there come Swart amulets the lips wax pale to kiss, [89] Days when the world hath faded from its bliss And all the merry music gone amiss. Ay, life is sweet, but ever and anon The spent heart cries on Avalon, Avalon. For oh, the ravin of this shadowy wood, The stain upon the sweetest songster's bill! The treason of this murmurous river-flood, Whose silvery course along the valley still, The trustful valley tranced in sunset rose, Breathes stealthy poison and consuming woes!
In the blithe eyes of Pan a horror grows. Beauteous is earth, but ever and anon The pierced heart cries on Avalon, Avalon. And woe is me for labor that is loss, For truth the seed locked in a fossil lie, And woe of woes for love whose martyr-cross Is wrought from wood of Eden spicery. A Voice, a Voice to read life's runic scroll! But from the hollow places of the soul Only her own fantastic echoes roll. Man lives by God, but ever and anon The starved heart cries on Avalon, Avalon. But what if death To new confusion bids? Who knows if labor ends with breath, Or tears with folded lids?
The spirit still may miss of rest, Though oft the daisies blow Above the hushed and darkened breast Shut close from sun and snow. Those halls, all curiously planned, Lie void, but whither thence Hath fled the tenant? Shall the wand Of peace her dews dispense In equal share to hearts that beat Undaunted till the even, And rebels whose unbidden feet Would storm the heights of heaven? Perchance no soul shall taste of sleep Until its task be sped.
The charge the living failed to keep Goes over to the dead. One perfect and mysterious Will Threads all this mortal maze, And calls each human voice to fill Harmonic note of praise. Death holds no secret slumber-bowers For our unfaithfulness. Then while the morning still is fair, The earth-winds o'er thee play, Speed on the Master's work, and bear The burden of thy day.
Ay, welcome each new toil and pain, The fiery angels sent To teach our harps their golden strain While yet in banishment ; Lest e'en for thee, whose steps may roam Far in some tangled glade, When all the sons of God flock home, The feast should be delayed. Not wrath, dear Lord, Thy mercy seals. Our own unrighteous hands Hold back Thy shining chariot-wheels, And rob the wistful lands.
But thou go forth and do thy deed, In forest and in town. Nor sigh for ease, while pain and need Are plucking at thy gown. And thus, when bitter turneth sweet, And every heart is blest, Perchance to thee God's hand shall mete His unimagined rest. Where Shall we find rest unto our souls? We bleed On thorn and flint, and rove in pilgrim weed From shrine to shrine, but comfort is not there. What went we out into thy desert bare, O Human Life, to see?
Thy greenest reed Is Love, unmighty for our utmost need, And shaken with the wind of our despair. A voice from heaven like dew on Hermon falleth, That voice whose passion paled the olive leaf In thy dusk aisles, Gethsemane, thou blest Of gardens. Faint with the sweets such sanctities exhale, Deep-brooding Doubt lets fall his winnowing flail, And feels his weary heart divinely stirred On Christmas Eve. For sudden lustres play o'er hill and dale, The silence thrills to music, mothers pale Smile like Madonnas, and the Christ, unblurred By mists of time, unslain, unsepulchred, Life's cup re-consecrates to Holy Grail On Christmas Eve.
O Night, the chosen of nights, ponging and dream of the years, Blessed thou art. Sweetly their chant soars through unsearchable space, Quivering vespers that thrill Into the deep nocturne, Symphony I fulfill, I who like Mary's face Wonder and yearn, Cherish, adore, keeping the watch above The Word made flesh to-night, Wonderful Word impearled In childhood holy-white, Word that is Godhood, Love, Light of the World.
There beams above a manger The child-face of a star. Thorny be our path and sterile, There is rest from pain and peril Where, with many a flashing gem, Jasper, chrysolite and beryl, Shines the new Jerusalem. Not for these my heart beats faster, But for her ascended Master. God send us quietness! The night is stiller than the day, And though the light be less White stars are gleaming from the deep And purple vast of sky.
The road unto the stars is steep, But dreams may fly. Slumber advances and recedes In delicate caprice That life may learn how much it needs And longs for peace. The dulcimer of patience hath A music all its own ; Outwearing joy and grief and wrath, A tender monotone To soothe us till o'er sense and sprite The enshadowing hush is drawn, And down the solemn tides of night We drift toward dawn.
I knock, O Sleep, the Comforter! Again My weakness faints unto thy great caress; The circling thought beats blindly through the brain With dull persistency of barren pain, And draws uncertain doubting and distress, To prove that man unto himself is very weariness. I see thy wall in shining grapevines dressed, But know that only on the further side Droop low the purple clusters. I do not fear to trust myself to thee ; Waking and danger are of closer kin, But what hast thou to do with grief or sin? Imprisoned from myself, I wander free, And no resplendent sun of noon grants such security.
I would not lie to-night so near the bars, If to thy realm fair entrance I may find, That through them I might see our mortal stars, And hear the passing of our earthly wind. In deepest grotto hide me, far apart From tone or touch, and guard mine eyelids welL Yea, charm the weary senses deaf and blind, And let me there lie face to face with thee. So shall the morning cleave the clouds to find Thy fragrance clinging to my waking mind; But what thy lips did whisper unto me I'll bear too fine for consciousness, too deep for memory.
Then call my footsteps in, silent warden, For even as I plead, night waxes late. Call me to rest within thy holy garden, And lift the latches of the rustic gate. Others have won where I may not avail, Childhood and age by countless millions pass ; Yea, guilty feet tread on where mine must fail, For thou art kind as death.
The faces pale Of myriad sleepers gleam in thy sweet grass, And only I am left without to weep and cry, Alas! Yet thou wilt take me in with all the rest, And walk among us in thine angelhood ; And we shall wake, and know we have been blessed, If unaware, and that thy presence stood In mercy by each weary son of earth, To make us spirit sons of God once more. From her beauty-haunted days But for this the spirit prays, For the ken more poet-clear, Keener eye and subtler ear.
Cries the soul for truth? Behold Here the sages' leaves unrolled, Luminous with golden light Genius-wrested from the night. This, O spirit, be thy boon, Swifter sense to read the rune From the ages' passion wrought And their deep, slow-laboring thought, Or to trace in dewy-wet Veinings of the violet, Moon-led tide or melting cliff, Nature's patient hieroglyph. Great All-Giver, find we still In the limits of Thy will Life's abundant garden-space, Balm and spice and blossom-grace. What though blooms surpassing fair Far above us flush the air? Let the clamorous heart admit How the vine too high for it Daily on its pathway strows Scented leaves of summer rose, And beware the heedless tread And the grace uncherishfcd.
From her joy-enfolded days Only this the spirit prays, But for this her cry she lifts, Power to grasp thy perfect gifts. Once a sage of sages, bowed By the griefs of many years, Led two young disciples, vowed Unto truth beyond their peers, To an empty room. Surprise Lit their eyes. Unto each he gave a coin, While they waited, fain to do What the master might enjoin. Tremulous his words and few: Only Allah's love can fill These our empty hearts. He has pain and age at his back, Crosses and frets enough; I have laughter and love and a spirit of Unconquerable stuff.
He has flouted my every step All day on the windy wold ; A knave in grain, he has blurred my brain And fooled me with fairy-gold. All wrestle-stained I shall come To the inn where the journey ends, With an empty scrip, but a song on my lip That may happen to make amends. Live as on a mountain.
Let men behold a Man. If they cannot suffer him, let them deal him death. Better to climb and die than plod in that dull cara- van. When we will not keep the path For any gleam of golden gate Nor chant of cloudy choir, A stinging grief they use for goad. Their love is sharp as wrath. They scourge us up the heavenly road With whips of woven fire. But how when smites The mace of sorrow, stings the malice-dart? To give God thanks in words — this is not hard ; But incense of the spirit — to distill From hour to hour the cassia and the nard Of fragrant life, his praises to fulfill?
Love giveth unto us Another year Of marvellous Ointments for weary feet, A shadow from the heat, Home welcomes and hearth-sweet Communion dear. To bind up hearts that break Beside us here. Hope giveth unto us Another year Adventurous To follow the climbing Good, By thorn and beast withstood, To heights of brotherhood, Through dim to clear. FELICES WE count them happy who have richly known The sweets of life, the sunshine on the hills, The mosses in the valley, love that fills The heart with tears as fragrant as thine own, O tender moonlight lily, over-blown, When the inevitable season wills, By gentle winds beside thy native rills — We count them happy, yet not these alone.
By luster of the gold set free from dross, By light of heaven seen best through earth's obscure, By the exceeding gain that waits on loss — Behold, we count them happy who endure. The universal tone Of Nature thus our poor self-seeking chideth. Not for ourselves alone! Beneath God's burning throne The ethereal soul was clothed with form and feeling To work some earthly task of cheer or healing, Strike out some spark of noble deeds, revealing The flame whence all are blown.
The seeds our hands have sown Shall yield their harvest to a younger reaper. We battle, heirs of many a churchyard sleeper, For scions to come, whose sworded thoughts strike deeper Than any we have known. O spirit, overgrown With tangled wrongs and strange confusions, bruising The wings of thy first faith, take courage, losing Thyself to find thyself, in patience choosing This watchword as thine own, — Not for ourselves alone! Only a generous deed, The gleam of a noble glance, And the freshened heart fares on to speed The world's deliverance. There is whiter bread than is made from wheat.
Ah, for the irksome deed Time plucks up as a weed! But myrtle and lily and balsam leaf, How came these in our harvest sheaf? A flutter their swift flight brings, Tremor to timid wings, To the fragile daffodil plumes A longing for tropic blooms, Longing to follow. Nay, yours is a sky of glass, Startled Canary. Those are but dreams that pass, Airy vagary. Stretch your glistening neck To the celery-leaf and peck.
Yellow your roof of bars ; What more do you know of the stars, Brother Canary? The pulse of his prisoned wings, Their thwarted desire, Throbs in each mounting note, And the bliss of him, angel-throat, From the dancing orchids soars Till his tiny heart adores In the golden choir. Do the words vary? One word her heart sufficed, Scent of a hidden rose: He laughs while love and death Are breaking mighty hearts, while Mammon jeers, He laughs a quiet laugh that echoeth The crystal spheres. If men of bitter lip Deride him, still the dancing children share His secret, and the golden willow-tip In April air, — Secret that shall surprise Doomsday to festival when through earth's dreams Of sorrow, pain, defeat, and sacrifice, The glory gleams.
So they cloistered him at his heart's desire, Though never a stave could he tone aright. With shame and grief was his soul afire To stand in the solemn candle light Abashed and mute before priest and choir And the little lark-voiced acolyte. Of penance and vigil he was not chary, With bitter rods was his body whipt ; Yet his heart, like a stag's, was wild and wary, Till at last, one morn, from the mass he slipt And hied him down to a shrine of Mary Deep in the dusk of the pillared crypt.
But here thou art lonely, while chants are soaring In the church above ; and a dancing man Might do thee disport. On his head and hands he tumbled featly, b.. Ay, even so long as the high mass lasted He plied his art in that darksome place, And never again he scourged nor fasted His eager body whose lissome grace Cheered Our Lady till years had wasted The dancer's force, and he drooped apace. And once, when the buds were bright on the larches And the young wind whispered of violets, He came like a wounded knight who marches To the tomb of Christ. With striving and sweats He made there under those sombre arches The Roman spring and the vault of Metz.
Then he could no more and, with hand uplifted, Saluted Our Lady and fell to earth, Where the monks discovered his corse all drifted Over with blooms of celestial birth ; For when human worship at last is sifted, Our best is labor and love and mirth. From men and cities and the thronging ways We come to fall before thy gracious throne In this deep solitude, where thou wilt raise Our burdened hearts, bewildered with the bliss And changing anguish of tumultuous days, To thy pure heights of peace. Ah, mother, kiss The fever from our lips that lost their song When they forgot thy touch, as seabirds miss The passion of their wings when human wrong Hath borne them inland from their natal spray.
Calm goddess, speak thy word that maketh strong, While o'er our wearied brows light shadows play, Dropt from the leaves that fleck the azure day. Ye who feel Yourselves but slaves beneath the blind control Of Circumstance, and bear his insolent heel [] On jour submissive necks, who yield the soul To the despondent hour that wasteth it, Forgetting how on rude and paltry scroll Fair signs and sacred words may yet be writ, Come to our joyous mother! Where she leads Her fleecy streamlets down the hillsides, sit And let the dawning wind that wakes the reeds Refresh your heavy lids, whilst ye behold How sunshine revels in the lowliest weeds, And only human growths refuse to fold In narrow cups their heritage of gold.
Deep in the dim recesses of the heart, Where each man hides a poet. Yet spirits fill the wood for him who sees. IV Yea, for the souls in pain our mother waits With healing symbols. See her ocean beat On barren sands and foam in rocky straits With unavailing flow and vain retreat. A restless breast that hoary pilgrim hath; Dead faces touch it coldly, and his feet Rage round the iron shores with fruitless wrath, To escape his bondage. But yon moon, as chill As some relentless conscience, points the path And, moaning, he obeys. Within those circling spheres are fiery wars, And yet their beauteous orbits they fulfill.
Full text of "America the Beautiful: And Other Poems"
Even heaven's wild hearts, the flaming meteors, No rebels are, but far ambassadors. Between the wastes of level white And the cloud-drift dim and gray, In tasselings of tender light Beauty consoles the day. They lose full many a scene like this Who flee our winter rude, As hearts that turn from sorrow miss Its hushed beatitude. How often, when the wild March mornings broke, Have I descried thee, like a demon priest, Heaping hoarse curses on the riotous East From the bare branches of some tossing oak! A carnival of sleeted snows! The elms were keen Mercutios, Dazzling with such a diamond wit No Capulet could suffer it.
In muffled bush I marked her fret, The crook-backed nurse of Juliet. Two opalescent briars pricked Like Beatrice and Benedict. Beyond their tinkling repartee Stood marble-wrought Hermione, With ghost and mantled Prospero And many a " mockery king of snow. Enskied and sainted Isabel Had stolen from her nunnery cell, And where the burdened hemlock threw Dark shadow on the drift, I knew A sable-suited Hamlet bowed Above Ophelia in her shroud.
Through her summit high The winter winds have swept with bitter cry And left her desolate, a crownless queen, Yet beautiful for amber lights serene That all the ebon outlines glorify. Fairer to behold Than all those summer graces they forget, Her boughs are as a shadow on the air, A foil, a fretwork in the flood of gold.
Soft winds wander through The tufts of meadow grasses gaunt and few, And golden-tipped the cloudy willows shine Along the far-off brooks. Our hearts divine Old Winter sleeps and smiles, as sleepers do, Dreaming of winsome Spring. May all sweet dreams come true!
The sun sheds emeralds on the spray, And sapphires on the lake; A million wings unfold to-day, A million flowers awake. Their starry cups the cowslips lift To catch the golden light, And like a spirit fresh from shrift The cherry tree is white. With long, green raiment blown and wet, The willows, hand in hand, Lean low to teach the rivulet What trees may understand Of murmurous tune and idle dance, With broken rhymes whose flow A poet's ear shall catch, perchance, A score of miles below. Across the sky to fairy-realm There sails a cloud-born ship ; A wind-sprite standeth at the helm With laughter on his lip.
The melting masts are tipped with gold; The broidered pennons stream ; The vessel beareth in her hold The lading of a dream. It is the hour to rend thy chains, The blossom-time of souls. Yield all the rest to cares and pains; To-day delight controls. Gird on thy glory and thy pride, For growth is of the sun ; Expand thy wings, whate'er betide ; The summer is begun.
Thy fine yet frolic mirth Uplifts the soul on every wee bird's wing. Thy beauty hallows all the laboring earth, O perfect Spring. And Youth, no less, If Youth divined the sweetness she might shed, She would not dim by one unworthiness The coronal upon her queenly head. She would not mar the dream That makes illimitable longing cling About her rose-clad grace, nor once blaspheme The Gods of Spring.
The songs of May are on the dulcet air, Blithe carols, trills, melodious mating calls. Life, pulsing, poignant life is in the air. The winter-wasted heart, that dared blaspheme By weary apathy and bleak despair The Joy Supreme Re-blossoms into dream. Oh 9 the wind — the wind and the sun!
Take the blithe adventure of the fugitive to-day; Youth will soon be done. From buds that May is kissing there trembles forth a soul; The rosy boughs are whispering the white ; Gypsy-heart is heedless now of thrush and oriole, Dreaming, dreaming, dreaming of delight. Ofc, the song — the song in the blood!
Magic walks the forest; there's bewitchment on the air. Spring is at the flood. Gypsy-heart is anguished with tumultuous desire, Seeking, seeking, seeking for its own. Oh, the far — the far is the near! All the world is here. Choose, oh, choose, Choose a Valentine, In the sunbeams and the dews Only thine! Call, call, call; On some twig she swings; Apple-blossoms somewhere fall Down her wings. Strow, wind, strow, Strow the drifted blooms; Blithest hearts may beat below Brownest plumes.
Questions?
Trill your mirth High to heaven above; Trill the tune of all the earth, — Love, love, love! Waiting for a feather, Cozy birdlings fast asleep Dream together, Dream, dream, dream Of a brooding breast, On folded wings in shade and gleam Lightly pressed. Not a bird in thicket sings; Chill winds sigh. Fill the ruined nest with snow ; Blight the fern. Summer, pass To thy sepulchre. Ye whose days are as the grass, Weep for her.
Sad whippoorwill his solitary lay Had scarcely ceased when clear from wood and wold Rang out the choral melodies of day. And while the moon, a pallid film and cold, Was fading back into a cloud of gray, The blithe young sun illumed with living gold The crested waves and amber-misted spray. God wills One nature to the mountains, and to thee, Tumultuous deep, a different destiny.
But O my ocean, O my saddest, bravest, Forever flinging thy wild heart away, Forever forced from the land thou cravest By secret laws thy being must obey! Thine is it still to strive and fail and long ; But where hath earth a music like thy song? The isles and capes fall far behind, Blown backward by the salty wind. The sky her sapphire chalice turns Upon the deep, which gleams and burns With sunlight ; in the midst we ride, A fleck upon the sheeny tide.
Millions of sparkles leap and dance Above the blinding, blue expanse; And on the round horizon-rim The ghosts of vessels dawn and dim. Beneath our bended glances break The splendors of the shimmering wake. We watch the iris-shedding wheel, We hear the swift, melodious keel, [] And wonder, when with placid eye Some strange sea-monarch plunges by Between his waves in marshaled file That doff their white-plumed caps the while. What is this marvel that is wrought Within our silent haunts of thought?
We hail no ships of roseate shells; We catch no mermaid's bridal bells ; No siren's song with yearning stirs The souls of drifting mariners. Yet on the main whose gray heart beat Beneath the westward-sailing fleet That bore Columbus, 'neath the sun That shone on builded Babylon, Ourselves unto ourselves grow strange, Made conscious of our mortal change. We are the dream, and only we, 'Twixt the enduring sky and sea. The gleaming skies Are royal with old goddesses and queens Whose faces lit the earth till, banished thence, They watch from heaven the fair, familiar scenes That nevermore shall do them reverence, Though humbled Cassiopaea earthward leans, And Cynthia sheds her old beneficence.
THE HARPER THE self-sufficing, perfect moon sat in the skies alone, Save for one star, a little page below her amber throne, And yet it was the star whose harp made all the heavens glisten With brother stars come stealing out from their blue tents to listen. The sky is full of swallows, With a twitter in their bills. The sky is full of swallows, The air is full of sun, And sparkling winter follows, When autumn's done. Ivory pillar, crystal rafter, Make a palace of the wood.
The world is blithe with laughter, She wears an ermine hood. The world peeps out in laughter. Her hood will melt anon. But oh, the spring comes after, When winter's gone. Gleam of bluebirds, flute of thrushes, Thrill the blossom-misted trees. Arbutus balms the breeze. Sea and summit tempt the rover; Fairy horns to forest call. The bees are drunk with clover, The earth's a dancing ball. The bees are drunk with clover. The poem of the year Turns a new leaf over, And autumn's here. Thus my grandsire led his bride, lily-robed and gentian- eyed, Past the brook that sang unceasing her new name in silver tone, [] Underneath the maple grove where the leaves such car- pet wove, As their jealous blushes strove to surpass the maid- en's own, To a cottage, woodbine-thatched, whose rude door his hand unlatched, While above the drooping eyelids with their dreamy smile below, Close he bent his comely head, — so the gossip squirrels said, Peeping through the oak-leaves red, fifty happy years ago.
For their love white plumage lent to the days of their content, And so swift the singing seasons flew before their wedded feet, That themselves might scarcely know where the sun- beams met the snow, And the blossoms ceased to blow in the shadow of the wheat. Thus their youth ran into age, and albeit their pil- grimage Knew full many a thorn-set passage where they fainted as they trod, When the brooding sunset light flooded every vale and height, All the way seemed golden bright in the constant smile of God.
Straight we flocked from east and west back to the forsaken nest, Some with storm-beat, broken plumage; some with grace of dovelike ways; Eagle hearts and pinions strong; twilight voices sweet of song, And the twittering broods that throng on the leafy summer sprays. From the north and south we came, all the children of his name, Blown like autumn leaves together homeward to the parent tree, And he blessed us one and each in his quaint, unlettered speech, Praying all our feet might reach mansions by the crystal sea. Then with smiles and tender tears, honoring the gar- nered years, We in turn our costly tokens did with loving hands unfold, [] But the old man turned him where little faces pressed his chair, For the gifts he counted fair were those clustering heads of gold.
Ah, what impatient pulses beat In those poised wings, what sudden heat To quit the isle whose April smile The blithe nest-builders found so sweet! Before them lie the gardens fair With balm and bloom and purple air. They leave behind the boding wind, The frosted fields, the branches bare. Thou, too, O soul, disdain to flee Where siren ease would beckon thee. In stress and strain and battle-pain, Win thou thy peace by victory.
Green glanced the hope and garnet glowed the pride, All ghost and wreckage ere the year is done. Strangely these victims of the frost and storm Beneath that crystal shield their hues reclaim, Pouring such treasured glories forth as form A tessellated floor of sudden flame. How much of loss and ruin went to weave This flush as transient as a world's desire! But who would not be shattered to achieve Such brief, divine apocalypse of fire! His stormy trumpets blow; The swift, dim lines of the beating rain Blossom to starry snow, Till the air is white as a nun With the whirling, thistledown grace Of myriad flakes, and every one A fret of fairy lace.
Each naked stem they cloak Till it shines like a birch in spring, And each dry leaf that clings to the oak Becomes a feathery wing. With morning the drifts are deep, And strangely over them go, Like dreams on the silent heart of sleep, Shadows of jay and crow; But the hungry chickadees wait, Their tree-hollow sealed with ice, Till the sun shall open that crystal gate To a sparkling paradise ; For never a branch so bare, So gnarled and crooked and gray, But it dazzles with diamonds unaware And rainbows out at play. For we shall meet before The throne of God.
The drifting snows confuse Thy foot-prints. Down the echoing wind I lose Thy voice. We shall meet once more. When from the grave of Time thou com'st again To front my soul in Judgment, witness bear To error, failure, sin ; but oh, my prayer, My strife forget thou not! All uncrowned, with his hair unbound, His white hair loose on the wind, The Old Year goes to his long repose, But he casts his gifts behind.
With glimmer of tears and flicker of smile, He takes his place in the pilgrim file Of the dim-eyed years who journey along, Shrilling us back a discordant song, That mingles and blends with the distance and ends In a harmony soft and strong. All unknown, it is thou alone Who canst tell thine errand aright, — A whispered thought when the world was not, And a sign made in the night. Our paths of rustling silken grass Will soon be ermine bands of white Spotted with tiny steps that pass On silent errands in the night.
The river will be locked in hush But frosted like a fairy lawn With knots of crystal flowers that flush By moonlight, blanching in the dawn, Flown are our minstrels, golden-wing And rosy-breast and ruby-throat, But all the pines are murmuring A sweet, orchestral under-note. Then Time shall lift a starry torch In signal to his gentle Twin Who, stooping from a shining porch, Gathers the drowsy children in.
I wonder if, through that strange sleep Unstirred by clock or silver chime, Our dreams will not the cadence keep Of those unresting feet of Time, And follow on his beauteous path From snow to flowers, from flowers to snow, And marvel what high charge he hath, Whither the fearless footsteps go. Up the mill-wheel's prose Ran a music-beat. Love planted a rose, And the world turned sweet. Would you wend from my heart of hearts? Shall I hold my guest my thrall? Peace to the rose that starts wherever your footsteps fall!
All dark in my heart of hearts? Nay, the skies that once were far, The skies whence the lightning darts, the skies where the rainbows are, Look in through the broken thatches. Only the wind at the latches, But glad is my heart of hearts with the glory of sun and star. She is the hidden carol in The fringes of the wood, The sudden blue when clouds wax thin, The joy of good.
KIRKUS REVIEW
May God who wrought our fleeting race Forbid her fatal star, Remembering she is the grace Of all that are. If we could part 'Twere night indeed. But go Not yet, not yet, lest we forget The saint's punctilio. If my earliest sight by the morrow light Be the pearl of thy tender face, Saint Valentine will assure thee mine For another twelve moons' space. How else, mine All? When these eyelids fall, They fold thy beauty in ; And when the light calls home my sprite, And the mists of dreamland thin, I awake to thee, though land and sea, Ay, though the skies debar, I awake to the grace of thy visioned face, My changeless morning-star.
Life allots austerely Unto the rose of love the thorny power To tear the heart, but ah, love's anodyne! The prick but proves the presence of the flower, Our one white rose from gardens all divine. Then, only then, could grief outlast her hour Were I ungrieved by least rebuff of thine. The rainbow alchemist That turns the sunshine gold To green and amethyst ; A princess in brocade, Woods dipped in autumn dyes, A holiday parade Of tinted butterflies; The million-colored blooms Whose dainty buds and leaves Were wrought in fairy looms On sweet midsummer eves ; The jeweled domes and spires That rise with vesper hymn Beyond the western fires — Are all too dim.
How shall I tell my love? The snowflake petals shed From happy garths above Wherein they blossomed On trees of cloudy grace ; The frost that decks the pine With weft of glittering lace In exquisite design ; The pearl in ocean deeps, And lilies half unblown, A marble shaft that keeps The moonlight watch alone?
My song no symbol knows. The blush of maidenhood, The swarthy tropic rose, The lightning flash that rends The veil of heaven in twain ; Pomegranate branch that bends With fruit of ruddy stain ; Coals in the evening grate, Whereon who strictly looks Sees elves illuminate His sealed spirit-books; The fiery hearts that groan In seared volcanoes old; The sun on flaming throne — Are all too cold.
Though crucible break, Shrink not from the alchemist's hour, When he wills to make From the shards of thine agony Power. Nor would the waste and wreck of orient towers, Slow-sunken from the reach of sun and showers, Tax the un featured sands for burial room, Were love but true. For love is lord of earth's phantasmal powers, And all that seems with his own fact he dowers. The shapes of art, the growths of nature's womb, From love, the one reality, take doom, And life might laugh at death that overlowers, Were love but true.
God hung the dawn with carmine and pillared it with gold To welcome in our new Love, the angel of the old. With lips still pale from requiems and litanies she came, But home-sweet lights were in her eyes, — the same and not the same. For the least of beauty that comes To the convict watching a cloud, The least of love in those homes Too poor for cradle or shroud, Is Beauty transcending dust, Is Love that rebukes the beast. Let us say a grace for the crust That falls from the infinite feast.
Feast me no feasts that for the few are spread, With holy cup of brotherhood ungraced, For though I sicken at my daily bread, Bitter and black, I crave the human taste. Knights of rueful countenance Gloom the amber hall Where in praise of Dame Romance Dulcet harpings fall. Should your spear in tourney break, Be the first to weave Garlands for the victor's sake; And, at shut of eve, If the usher touch your sleeve, Gracefully the hint receive.
Kiss your hand to Life and take Courtly leave. And worshipped Art's disdain; But he fought his manhood's fight beneath The ruddy flag of Fain. Not the soul Unproved, outside the warrior fellowship, But some pale Michael whom the devil's grip Had all but ravished of his aureole. Are such the scorners? Ah, not they, who know The stealthy lures of evil, how the weight Of opportunity confederate With passion presses to the overthrow.
For sweet Saint Charity is not as one Whose lily paces print the garden way Of youth and innocence. Her hair is gray; There is no sinner she is fit to shun. In midmost battle's shock and stress The hero-heart is best revealed. Unveil the splendor of thy shield; The ancestral sword didst long to wield, Swing high, and heaven the charge will bless, O Hero-Heart! So calm a step and so serene A brow had graced some honored queen Within whose crown had long been worn, Beneath the gems a bleeding thorn, But who upon her queendom stood, Above her tortured womanhood, And ruled her loyal people well, Because she ruled herself.
So fell This woman's presence on the street, Made purer by her passing feet. Though humbly clad, her lifted face Was lighted by so fine a grace Men turned to note the way she took, Or met, with conscious, startled look, The soul that leaned from out her eyes. Intense and pitiful and wise; — A wondrous, wistful, solemn gaze, To be remembered through the days.
I know she passed me, while I stood Surprised by sense of brotherhood. The long street wavered, and I saw The beauty of the starry law By which each shifting figure moved My fellow and my friend beloved. And trembling with the sweet, new sense, The rapture of benevolence, I looked for her whose glance could find The secret spring of humankind, But she had vanished down the street, To bless it by her passing feet.
What iron years have forged that rugged phiz From sometime baby features soft and dim? What is most like her? The bud of a rose, — of a moss-rose, fair, Flushed and dainty, a folded flower, The blossom a woman is fain to wear Over the heart. May sun and shower Brim her cup to the overflow With dewy perfume, if this be so! Or call her rather a nestling dove That fluttered down through the moonlight amber. To be brooded under the wings of love Here in a hushed and happy chamber. May never a stain of our earth below Dim her plumage, if this be so!
I liken her unto a pearl, — a pearl From seas of trouble. But whist, my numbers! What strains are these for our baby-girl, Shut like a star in a mist of slumbers? They vex her dreams with their tuneless flow. She heard the angels a night ago. Said a stately lily as ever grew: O Baby Bud, ere your petals knew Earth's lightest blemish, our fragrant-souled, The blossoms whispered the whole night through Of a secret sweet — as sweet as you. Lashes laid in slumber meek, Fringe with gold a tender cheek Tinted like the dewy sprays Of the blossomed peach, whose praise Floods the robin's roundelays.
And as if a white-rose tree Dropped its daintiest petal, see How the dimpled hand gleams fair Through the ripples of her hair, Clasped by angels unaware. Who shall sing her cradle-song? Silver streams would do her wrong; Whispering leaves are over rude, And the twitter in the wood From the linnet's nestling brood.