Collected poems and The window of souls

Front matter

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Contents

Love Songs 7

Songs of the Sea 53

Poems of Nature 85

II

I've lived, I've loved, I've suffered; these have made Time's little span from April's spring to spring ; I've staked and won; I've staked and lost and paid, And with it all life's such a blessed thing.

Ill

We grow old : While winds of Age are blowing We build new walls, where castles stood before; With Hope we go, the seeds of joy be-so wing, As if we stood at Life's unopened door.

WAY DOWN IN CAEOLINE

If I were king or seraph

Secure upon a throne, With all the world could give me,

These gladly I'd disown, If Time would change to other days,

Where childhood's memories twine, And you and I could love once more

Way down in Caroline !

Perhaps 'twas not so passioned

As that of later years, So strongly made and fashioned

That filled the soul with tears; But it was true and tender

As leaves on jasmine vine, When you and I were lovers,

Way down in Caroline !

The years have crowded thick and fast —

The hand of care has left its trace, And many a shadow of the past

Has marred the lines of childhood's face. Yet these can never fade nor dim

The tender thoughts that yet entwine Our hearts, when love first sang his hymn

Way down in Caroline.

Clear shines the sun — and twilight calls —

With many a tender mystery, And somehow plenteous blessings fall

Upon life's later road for me; But, ah ! I'd give them, one by one,

If childhood's sun once more would shine And you and I could love once more — Once more, in Caroline !

THE KUBAIYAT AND YOU

I

Today I found old Omar's song you sent Me years and years ago, with many a burning line Marked by your hand ; — Your love and his were blent From page to page. A new joy seemed to shine From Persian singer, dawning all anew From out the sweet, dead years, because of you.

II

Once more the glamor of the faded years shone out From that Utopian land in which I dreamed And whence your creed of gladness drove all doubt; Yet all the years that since have intervened

Have left no cloud upon life's sky of blue — To me the Eubaiyat is still a part of you.

WHEN SHALL WE MEET

The day when we shall meet Long spent desire will blossom into flame, Old dreamings wake at whisper of your name At coming of your feet.

The days when we shall meet Full measured joy, somehow, will come to me; Of all within the gift of Destiny I shall not ask for more ; the melody Of love will be complete.

DREAMS OF YOU

Somehow I see you in the wildwood places Where Nature's pictured canopies unfold The glory of the blossoms' upturned faces, Where sylvan silences a tryst unfold

And where we meet beneath the oaken shade As Love's own hand upon our heads is laid.

Out on the hills, with summer sunlight gleaming You seem to walk beside me where I go — When all my little world is filled with dreaming I hear your whisper in the breeze that blow:

Then by the brook that falls o'er rocky stair I pause and find you still beside me there.

But most of all, when Day his dream-book closes And all the West with gold is set afire, Somehow your pulsing hand in mine reposes Then all my soul is rent with old desire:

And as the night bestars her arch of blue Sleep comes to bless me with new dreams of you.

DAY AND NIGHT

Through all the splendor of the day Men, hand in hand, with Virtue went; While Sin alone betook his way With grief and discontent.

But when the lights of day went out, And lights of night came on, Men walked the streets with Sin about While Virtue walked alone.

BECAUSE HE CARRIED LOVE WITHIN HIS HEAET

Where'er he went the gayest birds would sing: Somehow the clouds were never in his sky,

Along his way the rarest flowers would spring, Life was a Song to him with ne'er a sigh.

All day he toiled, from dawn to sable night, But whistled as he worked along the way,

And people wondered how one toiler might Winnow such gladness from each busy day.

None ever guessed even half the joy he knew, Nor yet how well he played life's little part ;

To him the skies above were ever blue

Because he carried love within his heart.

FOR LOVE'S RETURNING

I

I keep the sanded walks all swept and trim. Along whose edge the budding roses wait — Listening to hear the quickened step of him Pass hitherward through yonder open gate.

II

Within my heart the fires of fancy burn! And Song is busy with his minstrelsy. Expectant, listening! How I wish and yearn, Blessing the day when he shall come to me!

Ill

O Life ! O Love ! O laggard days that wait — How slow ye go — and how my eyelids burn With watching for his presence at the gate! O Life ! O Love ! O blessed Love, return !

WITH YOU— WHERE YOU AKE

Where'er your blessed feet shall turn To whispered footfalls of the night, The candles there for me shall burn- Shall burn a holier light To guide me from the noisy street To one still room where two shall meet.

Though miles between us intervene These unto Love can be no bar: Through mist of night your face serene Looks up to mine— just as you are; So when the twilight candles burn We both toward one doorway turn.

And as you sit within the glow Where ashen embers blaze and flare Somehow, I stretch my arms to know And feel, that you are there, For ne'er the nightfall lights its star But I am with you— where you are.

EOSE OF MY GARDEN

Out in the glow of a summer morn, Out where the mists of the gray dawn lay, A rose in my beautiful garden was born And lived its life through one sweet day: The fair dawn passed with no one to see This beautiful rose of the morn, save me.

Into my life, when the youth-spell kept Its mystery dreams of the untried years The passionate love of a woman swept And held me fast as one who hears A siren's call, yet no one knew The joy she brought to my soul, save you.

THE NOVICE

I

How much of penance must I pay to earn my place

in Paradise!

How far from duty's road may stray, yet find my welcome in the skies: The world is full of passion'd things; both

Youth and Love have called to me, Oh ! how the mortal round me clings, while I would seek eternity !

II

I wonder if the stern world knows, that world which

scoffs at things divine, How guilt and sin, like winter snows, blow on this helpless soul of mine!

I count the beads, each one by one, then look

across the fields of May Where, underneath the blessed sun , Life beckons where the love-lutes play.

Ill

I am but human, God must know how frail the novice

soul can be, And when temptations come and go, alas! what is there left for me But woman's wish, by passion fired, concealed

within a woman's heart, That in the bright, sweet world of Love, my soul could have its part!

FOE YOUR BIRTHDAY

Strange does it seem that here in this latest summer, Far from our first, that sleeps where memory stays That still we should go, with aims that never shall

murmur — Living one life — one hope — through the long sweet

days.

Tender and good, the measure of Time has waited, Through all these years, with leisure enough to woo — As we toiled and loved — with the toil of happiness

sated ; And our souls kept young because of the work to do.

No longer we ask if life be worth the living: Hence, now, we plead what measure shall yet remain Of golden years, through which our souls, still giving, Shall richer grow, like the reapers' yellow grain.

The frost of time, whose touch the head shall whiten, Nor hand of years, that lines the face with care, Shall mar your smile; but these shall only heighten, For me, youth's bloom, forever planted there.

This year comes back with the thoughts of youth

so tender, That again we walk where the mountain shadows

play— And, as then, I give, whatever the heart can render, Of love, that burns to his later, happier day.

HAGAR'S FAREWELL

Farewell, farewell ! white tents of girlhood days, Of maidenhood and of that nameless vale Where Love first bloomed: and in whose skies

yet sail The dreams of romance, which cannot avail Aught now for me, save like unto some toy With which- old Memory plays And in whose handling finds some scanty joy.

Farewell, white tents, you glitter on the plain, Like argosies upon some tropic sea ! But ah! the bitterness your sight brings back

to me: The birth of Love, its bloom, the agony Of motherhood, but most of all the pain When Love was scorned, and I Touched hands with Jealousy, The memory of which will never die.

See yonder waste, Oh Ishmael, my own! See yonder sands where never lifts a tree, Or oasis to shelter you and me: That is our home. This, with its mystery, The endless plain, with heat and hunger sown, Is our abode. Only the stars above, The orient stars, so full of light and love, Shall compensate us: these, and liberty.

WHEN LOVE DEPAETED

When Love went out and softly closed the door, Then paused to look with pathos in his eye, For me the noon-day sun went from the sky Alas, and I,

Who had been rich — was desolate and poor!

He kissed his hand from down the narrow lane That wound unto our cottage of content, Then slowly turned about and outward went, Onward intent,

Never to cross this little path again.

I never knew the joy his presence meant

About this ingle nook and down the hall, Where I so often heard his merry call, Until this pall

Of his farewell brought me my punishment.

THE GATE

Soft echoes from the temple bells, The picture of a fallen gate, And one who needs must wait Where sad-faced Memory dwells.

She stood inside its topmost bar, I stood beneath the pine tree shade, While lutes of twilight played For her and evening star.

Two roads diverging far apart, Our f ragil craft wrecked on the sea : Love's memory left for me This gate and broken heart.

DOGWOOD AND JASMINE

The dogwood fringes woods with white, The leaves new fragrance bring

While jasmine hangs its yellow lamps To light the way of Spring.

Yet never blooms the flowers anew

But a face comes back serene;

The dogwood and the jasmine

Both keep her memory green.

WHEN YOU USED TO SING

When twilight shadows burn to softer glowing

And weary day with toiling is be-spent, When night comes on so lavishly be-sowing, With silver stars the sullen firmament; When footsteps turn toward the embers burning

And memory twines about each cherished thing. Ah! how my soul is filled with nameless yearning, As in the past, once more to hear you sing !

II

The silent halls, as in the days long ended

Are just the same — your picture on the wall — Your music there, in light and darkness blended,

No sound within — save when I hear you call: Soft as the stillness, where the twilight lingers Your words come back from memory's scented spring The ivory keys are touched by vanished fingers, And as of old, once more I hear you sing.

FLOWEKS OF YESTEKDAY

The bright wistaria hangs its plumes Along the hedge's path of gray,

But not with Youth's enchanged smile

When bloomed the things of yesterday.

The tulips burn with crimson glow Forecasting glories of the May —

But ah! I turn

And somehow, yearn,

For blossoms of the yesterday.

Each jonquil lifts its cup of gold Along the footpath's charted way, Yet these have not the flame of old When life's young world was gay.

Ah! jonquil blooms are not the same As jonquils of the yesterday!

The lilac plumes are scented still

And wave above the sward of gray:

Their perfumes every ingle fill;

But, somehow, I am changed — or they,

For these are not the kind she wore, The lilac plumes of yesterday.

LOVE'S LITTLE WOELD

I

Where the hearthstone embers smoulder Love's own voice is softly calling; On her face the lights are falling As the years grow old and older.

Love's domain is small, but luring, One sweet face, content and smiling; But its' force is all beguiling And its strength is all enduring.

It is she, who reads the story By the fireside, still and lonely That can make this ingle only All my wide, sweet world of glory.

II

Just one little face so tender Just these hands, so white and slender, And one heart that still remembers Makes my bliss, where glow the embers Where the hearthstone dreamings smoulder As the years grow old ond older.

Ah ! but such a tiny thing Makes the heart forever sing: Life is small, I do aver, Just this room, old love and her.

WHAT THE MANDOLIN SAID

Out of a Past where Mem'ry keeps Her cherished things and weeps I list — and hear, when the grate is red, And phantom folk in the gloaming tread To the words her mandolin said.

A pine tree lifts its branches high

In pleading to the sky: The yellow blooms of the jasmine vine Like lamps swing low and somehow twine

About her words and heart of mine.

Her dainty fingers touched the strings:

Then melody of things Lute-like and musical and sweet Beneath the pine tree seemed to meet

Where Love's own harvest was complete.

In every note the moonlight swayed:

At touch her fingers made Upon the strings old loves seemed wed As when one through a dream is led,

At the words her mandolin said.

The lute-like notes brought back again

White spray of April rain: And dew-wet lilacs scent the air Once more, as when she blessed them there ;

Ah! mandolin and golden hair.

YULETIDE AND YOU

A winter's sky and stars without, Pale moon and memories calling

Encompass all my world about; God's blessing on me falling.

A scent of lilacs through the room,

Like holy incense burning Awakens through the twilight gloom

A lover's ardent yearning.

Out there the wind sweeps o'er the plain;

Within, the glowing embers; Love weaves about his golden chain

The Yuletide yet remembers!

II

Twilight and gloom fill all the room, Time's prosy things receding,

While Dreams along the hallway bloom And faces smile in pleading.

As daylight dies from out the skies And night bestows his blessing

I catch a gleam from Love's sweet eyes And feel his soft caressing.

Ill

Somehow an angel's touch is laid

Upon the brow of Sorrow, And every debt of sin is paid

With dawning of tomorrow.

So hang the mistletoe above

The hallway and the landing

That one may kiss the brow of Love Beside the hallway standing.