Debris | Page 5

to her, the
mystery of life. Ha, ha! Who claimed her by the church's law has given
us both to learn the mystery of death. What was't I loved? The eyes that
thrilled me through and through with their magnetic subtlety? They're
there, set on my face; but where's their lifened light? What was't I loved?
The mouth whose coral redness I have buried in my own? 'Tis there,
shrunk 'gainst two rows of dead pale pearls, and cold and colorless as
lip of statue carved of marble. Was it the form whose perfect outline
stamped it with divinity? It's there, but 'reft of all its
winsome
roundness, and stiffening in the chill of death. It makes me cold to look
upon its rigidness. But just this hour the breath went out; was't that I
loved? 'Twas this I clasped and kissed. What is it that we've christened
love, that glamours men to madness, and stains with falsehood virgin
purity? It made this grewsome charnel vault a part of Heaven--the
graves there of those murdered knaves made rests of roses for our
heads; it made him spring the bolt and lock us in. Where is the creed's

foundation? I've shrived a thousand souls--I cannot now absolve my
own. To quench this awful thirst, I cut an artery in my arm and sucked
its blood. The thirstness did not cease. They lied. 'Twas not the vultures
at Prometeus' heart, 'twas hunger at his vitals gnawed. The salt drops
that I swallowed from that vein have set my brain on fire. What's that?
The ground's a-tremble 'neath my feet as touched with life. Earth, rend
your breast and let me in! For anything but this dire darkness, made
alive with vengeful eye-balls--his eyes! They glare with hate at me. I
heard him laugh but now. For anything but this most loving corpse
whose head caressing rests it on my feet. Ah, no, I did not mean it thus;
I would not get away alone. I loved that corpse. It was the sweetest bit
of human frailty that to man e'er brought a blessing or a curse. I turned
from Dias' holy grail to taste its nectar. Hell, throw a-wide your
sulphur-blazoned gates, I'll grasp it in my arms and make the plunge!
Hist! what was that? I heard him laugh again. Laugh, fiend, you cannot
hurt me more. Ah! Reyenita, mine in life you were, in death you shall
be mine. When this clogged blood has stopped the wheels of life, I'll
put my arms around your neck, I'll lay my face against your frozen one,
and thus I'll die. When this foul place has crumbled to the sunlight,

some relic-hunting lunatic will stumble o'er our bones, and pitiless will
weave a tale for eyes more pitiless to read. Back, Stygian ghoul!
Death's on me now. I feel his rattle in my throat! My limbs are blocks
of ice! My heart has tuned it with the
muffled dead-march drum! A
jar of crashing worlds is in my ears! A drowsy faintness creeps upon--

The seal is broken, the mystery tell;
You have read the letters, what
do they tell?
Do they tell you the story they told that day
To me, in
the Mission old and gray--
The Mission Carmel at Monterey?
WASTED HOURS.
If that thy hand with heart-will sought,
To work with Christ-love
underlying,
But ere thou hadst accomplished aught
Time passed
thee by while vainly trying,
The wasted hour, the vain endeavor,

Will wait thee in the far forever.
If thou hadst toiled from dawn till eve,
But felt no thrill of joy in
giving
No heart made glad, no want relieved,
Lived but for selfish
love of living,
Though idle hours went by thee never,
The hours are
lost to thee forever.

ROCKING THE BABY.
I hear her rocking the baby--
Her room is just next to mine--
And I
fancy I feel the dimpled arms
That round her neck entwine,
As she
rocks, and rocks the baby,
In the room just next to mine.
I hear her
rocking the baby
Each day when the twilight comes,
And I know
there's a world of blessing and love
In the "baby bye" she hums.
I
can see the restless fingers
Playing with "mamma's rings,"
And the
sweet little smiling, pouting mouth,
That to hers in kissing clings,


As she rocks and sings to the baby,
And dreams as she rocks and
sings.
I hear her rocking the baby,
Slower and slower now,
And I know
she is leaving her good-night kiss
On its eyes, and cheek, and brow

From her rocking, rocking, rocking,
I wonder would she start,

Could she know, through the wall between us,
She is rocking on a
heart.
While my empty arms are aching
For a form they may not
press
And my emptier heart is breaking
In its desolate loneliness
I
list to the rocking, rocking,
In the room just next to mine,
And
breathe a prayer in silence,
At a mother's broken shrine,
For the
woman who rocks her