Second April | Page 6

has been,?Barnacled white and weeded brown?And slimed beneath to a beautiful green,?These wet rocks where the tide went down?Will show again when the tide is high?Faint and perilous, far from shore,?No place to dream, but a place to die,--?The bottom of the sea once more.?There was a child that wandered through?A giant's empty house all day,--?House full of wonderful things and new,?But no fit place for a child to play.
SONG OF A SECOND APRIL
April this year, not otherwise?Than April of a year ago,?Is full of whispers, full of sighs,?Of dazzling mud and dingy snow;?Hepaticas that pleased you so?Are here again, and butterflies.
There rings a hammering all day,?And shingles lie about the doors;?In orchards near and far away?The grey wood-pecker taps and bores;?The men are merry at their chores,?And children earnest at their play.
The larger streams run still and deep,?Noisy and swift the small brooks run?Among the mullein stalks the sheep?Go up the hillside in the sun,?Pensively,--only you are gone,?You that alone I cared to keep.
ROSEMARY
For the sake of some things?That be now no more?I will strew rushes?On my chamber-floor,?I will plant bergamot?At my kitchen-door.
For the sake of dim things?That were once so plain?I will set a barrel?Out to catch the rain,?I will hang an iron pot?On an iron crane.
Many things be dead and gone?That were brave and gay;?For the sake of these things?I will learn to say,?"An it please you, gentle sirs,"?"Alack!" and "Well-a-day!"
THE POET AND HIS BOOK
Down, you mongrel, Death!?Back into your kennel!?I have stolen breath?In a stalk of fennel!?You shall scratch and you shall whine?Many a night, and you shall worry?Many a bone, before you bury?One sweet bone of mine!
When shall I be dead??When my flesh is withered,?And above my head?Yellow pollen gathered?All the empty afternoon??When sweet lovers pause and wonder?Who am I that lie thereunder,?Hidden from the moon?
This my personal death?--?That lungs be failing?To inhale the breath?Others are exhaling??This my subtle spirit's end?--?Ah, when the thawed winter splashes?Over these chance dust and ashes,?Weep not me, my friend!
Me, by no means dead?In that hour, but surely?When this book, unread,?Rots to earth obscurely,?And no more to any breast,?Close against the clamorous swelling?Of the thing there is no telling,?Are these pages pressed!
When this book is mould,?And a book of many?Waiting to be sold?For a casual penny,?In a little open case,?In a street unclean and cluttered,?Where a heavy mud is spattered?From the passing drays,
Stranger, pause and look;?From the dust of ages?Lift this little book,?Turn the tattered pages,?Read me, do not let me die!?Search the fading letters, finding?Steadfast in the broken binding?All that once was I!
When these veins are weeds,?When these hollowed sockets?Watch the rooty seeds?Bursting down like rockets,?And surmise the spring again,?Or, remote in that black cupboard,?Watch the pink worms writhing upward?At the smell of rain,
Boys and girls that lie?Whispering in the hedges,?Do not let me die,?Mix me with your pledges;?Boys and girls that slowly walk?In the woods, and weep, and quarrel,?Staring past the pink wild laurel,?Mix me with your talk,
Do not let me die!?Farmers at your raking,?When the sun is high,?While the hay is making,?When, along the stubble strewn,?Withering on their stalks uneaten,?Strawberries turn dark and sweeten?In the lapse of noon;
Shepherds on the hills,?In the pastures, drowsing?To the tinkling bells?Of the brown sheep browsing;?Sailors crying through the storm;?Scholars at your study; hunters?Lost amid the whirling winter's?Whiteness uniform;
Men that long for sleep;?Men that wake and revel;--?If an old song leap?To your senses' level?At such moments, may it be?Sometimes, though a moment only,?Some forgotten, quaint and homely?Vehicle of me!
Women at your toil,?Women at your leisure?Till the kettle boil,?Snatch of me your pleasure,?Where the broom-straw marks the leaf;?Women quiet with your weeping?Lest you wake a workman sleeping,?Mix me with your grief!
Boys and girls that steal?From the shocking laughter?Of the old, to kneel?By a dripping rafter?Under the discolored eaves,?Out of trunks with hingeless covers?Lifting tales of saints and lovers,?Travelers, goblins, thieves,
Suns that shine by night,?Mountains made from valleys,--?Bear me to the light,?Flat upon your bellies?By the webby window lie,?Where the little flies are crawling,--?Read me, margin me with scrawling,?Do not let me die!
Sexton, ply your trade!?In a shower of gravel?Stamp upon your spade!?Many a rose shall ravel,?Many a metal wreath shall rust?In the rain, and I go singing?Through the lots where you are flinging?Yellow clay on dust!
ALMS
My heart is what it was before,?A house where people come and go;?But it is winter with your love,?The sashes are beset with snow.
I light the lamp and lay the cloth,?I blow the coals to blaze again;?But it is winter with your love,?The frost is thick upon the pane.
I know a winter when it comes:?The leaves are listless on the boughs;?I watched your love a little while,?And brought my plants into the house.
I water them and turn them south,?I snap the dead brown from the stem;?But it is winter with your love,--?I only tend and water them.
There was