More Songs From Vagabondia | Page 4

lulled to sleep
Beside the
Dorian water,
And still her eyelids keep

The glad unperished secret
From centuries of joy,
And memories of
the morning
When Helen sailed for Troy?
Is her name Gertrude, Kitty,
Hypatia, or what?
I seem to half
remember,
And yet have quite forgot.
That soft Hellenic laughter!
I marvel you don't make
An effort to be
early
In budding for her sake.
Just fancy hearing daily
That velvet voice of hers!
How do you
quell the riot
Of sap her coming stirs?
Perhaps she puts her face up,
(Dear Charity she is!)
For messages of
summer
And better worlds than this.
You cannot blush, poor Lilac;
It is not in your race.
I simply should
go crimson,
If I were in your place.
Do tell her all your secrets!
The Man declares she knows
Better
than any mortal
The wonder-trick of prose.
Our prose, I mean,--how beauty
Appears to you and me;
The truth
that seems so simple,
Which they call poetry.
They put it down in writing
And label it with tags,
The funny
conscious people
Who mask in colored rags!
They have a thing called science,
With phrases strange and pat.
My
dear, can you imagine
Intelligence like that?
And when they first discover
That yellows are not greens,
They
pucker up their foreheads
And ponder what it means.
And then those cave-like places,
Churches and Capitols,
Where
they all come together
Like troops of talking dolls,

To govern, as they term it,
(It's really very odd!)
And have what
they call worship
Of something they call God.
But Kitty, or whatever
May be her tender name,
Is more like us.
She guesses
What sets the year aflame.
She knows beyond her senses;
Do tell her all you can!
The funny
people need it,--
At least, so says The Man.
Good-by, dear. I must idle.
Sweet suns and happy rains!
How nice
to have these humans
With their inventive brains,--
Their little scraps of paper!
They certainly evince
Remarkable
discernment.
Your ever loving Quince.
AN EASTER MARKET.
Today, through your Easter market
In the lazy Southern sun,
I
strolled with hands in pockets
Past the flower-stalls one by one.
Indolent, dreamy, ready
For anything to amuse,
Shyfoot out for a
ramble
In his oldest hat and shoes.
Roses creamy and yellow,
Azaleas crimson and white,
And the
flaky fresh carnations
My Orient of delight,--
Masses and banks of blossom
That dazzle and summon the eye,
Till
the buyers are half bewildered
To know what they want. Not I.
Who would not rather be artist
And slip through the crowd unseen

To gather it all in a picture
And guess what the faces mean?
So down through the chaffering darkies
I pass to the sidewalk's end,

Through the smiling gingham bonnets
With their small farm-stuff
to vend.

When, hello! my dreamer, sudden
As call at the dead of night,
What
sets your pulses a-quiver,
What sets your fancy alight?
Sure of it! Mayflowers, mayflowers,
Scent of the North in spring!

Out in the vernal distance,
Heart of me, whither a-wing?
"Give me some!" Clutch the first handful,
Hungering rover of earth!

How I devour and kiss them,
Beauties that brought me to birth,
Away in the great north country,
The land of the lonely sun,
Where
God has few for his fellows,
And the wolves of the snowdrift run.
Once more to the frost-bound valley
Comes April with rain in her jar;

I can hear the vesper sparrow
Under the silver star.
And many and dear and gracious
Are the dreams that walk at my side

From the land of the lingering shadows,
As out of the throng I
stride.
Oh, well for you, mere onlooker,
Who drift through the world's great
mart!
But we of the human sorrow
Have a joy beyond your art.
DAISIES.
Over the shoulders and slopes of the dune
I saw the white daisies go
down to the sea,
A host in the sunshine, an army in June,
The
people God sends us to set our heart free.
The bobolinks rallied them up from the dell,
The orioles whistled
them out of the wood;
And all of their singing was, "Earth, it is well!"

And all of their dancing was, "Life, thou art good!"
THE MOCKING-BIRD.
Hear! hear! hear!
Listen! the word
Of the mocking-bird!
_Hear!
hear! hear!
I will make all clear;
I will let you know
Where the

footfalls go
That through the thicket and over the hill
Allure,
allure._
How the bird-voice cleaves
Through the weft of leaves

With a leap and a thrill
Like the flash of a weaver's shuttle, swift and
sudden and sure!
And la, he is gone--even while I turn
The wisdom of his runes to
learn.
He knows the mystery of the wood,
The secret of the solitude;

But he will not tell, he will not tell,
For all he promises so well.
KARLENE.
Word of a little one born in the West,--
How like a sea-bird it comes
from the sea,
Out of the league-weary waters' unrest
Blown with
white wings, for a token, to me!
Blown with a skriel and a flurry of plumes
(Sea-spray and
flight-rapture whirled in a gleam!)
Here for a sign of the comrade that
looms
Large in the mist of my love as I dream.
He with the heart of an old violin,
Vibrant at every least stir in the
place,
Lyric of woods where the thrushes begin,
Wave-questing
wanderer, still for a space,--
What will the child of his be (so