Anthology of Massachusetts Poets | Page 9

hot,
sweet smell of oaten-cake, the kettle purring soft, The
dear-remembered Irish speech-- they call to me how oft!
They mind me just a slip o' girl in tattered kirtle blue,
But oh they
loved me for myself, and not for what I do!
And never one but had a

joy to pass the time of day
With little Mag o' Monagan's a-laughing
down the way.
There's fifty roofs to shelter me where one was set before, But make me
free to that again-- I'll not be wanting more,
But sure I know not tears
nor gold can turn the years again To little Mag o' Monagan's a-singing
in the rain.
MARTHA HASKELL CLARK
CRETONNE TROPICS
THE cretonne in your willow chair
Shows through a zone of rosy air,

A tree of parrots, agate-eyed,
With blue-green crests and plumes of
pride
And beaks most formidably curved.
I hear the river,
silver-nerved,
To their shrill protests make reply,
And the palm
forest stir and sigh.
Curious, the spell that colors cast,
Binding the fancy coweb-fast,

And you would smile if you could know
I like your cretonne parrots
so!
But I have seen them sail toward night
Superbly homeward, the
last light
Lifting them like a purple sea
Scorned and made use of
arrogantly;
And I have heard them cry aloud
From out a tall palm's
emerald cloud;
And I brought home a brilliant feather,
Lost like a
flake of sunset weather.
Here in the north the sea is white
And mother-of-pearl in morning
light,
Quite lovely, but there is a glare
That daunts me.
Now the
willow chair
Suggests a more perplexing sea,
Till my heart aches
with memory
And parrots dye the air around,
And I forget the
pallid Sound.
GRACE HAZARD
TO HILDA OF HER ROSES
ENOUGH has been said about roses
To fill thirty thick volumes;

There are as many songs about roses
As there are roses in the world


That includes Mexico . . . the Azores ... Oregon ...
It is a pity your roses
Are too late for Omar . . .
It is a pity Keats has
gone . . .
Yet there must be something left to say
Of flowers like these!

Adventurers,
They pushed their way
Through dewy tunnels of the
June night
Now they confer.....
A little tremulous.....
Dazzled by
the yellow sea-beach of morning
If Herrick would tiptoe back . . .
If Blake were to look this way

Ledwidge, even!
GRACE HAZARD CONKLING
DANDELION
LITTLE soldier with the golden helmet,
O What are you guarding on
my lawn?
You with your green gun
And your yellow beard,
Why
do you stand so stiff?
There is only the grass to fight!
HILDA CONKLING
RED ROOSTER
RED ROOSTER in your gray coop,
O stately creature with
tail-feathers red and
blue,
Yellow and black,
You have a comb
gay as a parade
On your head:
You have pearl trinkets
On your
feet:
The short feathers smooth along your back
Are the dark color
of wet rocks,
Or the rippled green of ships
When I look at their
sides through water.
I don't know how you happened to be made
So
proud, so foolish,
Wearing your coat of many colors,
Shouting all
day long your crooked words,
Loud . . . sharp . . . not beautiful!
HILDA CONKLING

VELVETS
(BY A BED OF PANSIES)
THIS pansy has a thinking face
Like the yellow moon.
This one has
a face with white blots;
I call him the clown.
Here goes one down
the grass
With a pretty look of plumpness;
She is a little girl going
to school
With her hands in the pockets of her pinafore.
Her name
is Sue.
I like this one, in a bonnet,
Waiting,
Her eyes are so deep!

But these on the other side,
These that wear purple and blue,

They are the Velvets,
The king with his cloak,
The queen with her
gown,
The prince with his feather.
These are dark and quiet
And
stay alone.
I know you, Velvets,
Color of Dark,
Like the pine-tree
on the hill
When stars shine!
HILDA CONKLING
THE MOODS
THE Moods have laid their hands across my hair:
The Moods have
drawn their fingers through my heart;
My hair shall never more lie
smooth and bright,
But stir like tide-worn sea-weed, and my heart

Shall never more be glad of small sweet things,-
A wild rose, or a
crescent moon,-a book
Of little verses, or a dancing child.
My heart
turns crying from the rose and book,
My heart turns crying from the
thin bright moon,
And weeps with useless sorrow for the child.
The
Moods have loosed a wind to vex my hair,
And made my heart too
wise, that was a child.
Now I shall blow like smitten candle-flame:
I shall desire all things
that may not be:
The years, the stars, the souls of ancient men,
All
tears that must, and smiles that may not be,--

Yes, glimmering lights
across a windy ford,
And vagrant voices on a darkened plain,
And
holy things, and outcast things, and things,
Far too remote,
frail-bodied to be plain.
My pity and my joy are grown alike.
I cannot sweep the strangeness

from my heart.
The Moods have laid swift hands across my hair:

The Moods have drawn swift fingers through my heart.
FANNIE
STEARNS DAVIS
HILL-FANTASY
SITTETH by the red cairn a brown One, a
hoofed One,
High upon
the mountain, where the grasses fail.
Where the