Songs for a Little House | Page 7

midnight comes,

and paper lies
Clean, white, receptive, all that one can ask,
Alas for
drowsy spirit, weary eyes
And traitor hand that fails the well loved
task!
Who ever learned the sonnet's bitter craft
But he had put away his
sleep, his ease,
The wine he loved, the men with whom he laughed,

To brood upon such thankless tricks as these?
And yet, such joy does
in that craft abide
He greets the paper as the groom the bride!
O. HENRY--APOTHECARY
"O. Henry" once worked in a drug-store in Greensboro, N. C.
Where once he measured camphor, glycerine,
Quinine and potash,
peppermint in bars,
And all the oils and essences so keen
That
druggists keep in rows of stoppered jars--
Now, blender of strange
drugs more volatile,
The master pharmacist of joy and pain

Dispenses sadness tinctured with a smile
And laughter that dissolves
in tears again.
O brave apothecary! You who knew
What dark and acid doses life
prefers,
And yet with friendly face resolved to brew
These
sparkling potions for your customers--
In each prescription your
Physician writ
You poured your rich compassion and your wit!
FOR THE CENTENARY OF KEATS'S SONNET (1816)
"On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer."
I knew a scientist, an engineer,
Student of tensile strengths and
calculus,
A man who loved a cantilever truss
And always wore a
pencil on his ear.
My friend believed that poets all were queer,
And
literary folk ridiculous;
But one night, when it chanced that three of
us
Were reading Keats aloud, he stopped to hear.
Lo, a new planet swam into his ken!
His eager mind reached for it

and took hold.
Ten years are by: I see him now and then,
And at
alumni dinners, if cajoled,
He mumbles gravely, to the cheering
men:--
_Much have I travelled in the realms of gold_.
TWO O'CLOCK
Night after night goes by: and clocks still chime
And stars are
changing patterns in the dark,
And watches tick, and over-puissant
Time
Benumbs the eager brain. The dogs that bark,
The trains that
roar and rattle in the night,
The very cats that prowl, all quiet find

And leave the darkness empty, silent quite:
Sleep comes to
chloroform the fretting mind.
So all things end: and what is left at last?
Some scribbled sonnets
tossed upon the floor,
A memory of easy days gone past,
A
run-down watch, a pipe, some clothes we wore--
And in the darkened
room I lean to know
How warm her dreamless breath does pause and
flow.
THE COMMERCIAL TRAVELLER
Ah very sweet! If news should come to you
Some afternoon, while
waiting for our eve,
That the great Manager had made me leave
To
travel on some territory new;
And that, whatever homeward winds
there blew,
I could not touch your hand again, nor heave
The logs
upon our hearth and bid you weave
Some wistful tale before the
flames that grew....
Then, when the sudden tears had ceased to blind
Your pansied eyes, I
wonder if you could
Remember rightly, and forget aright?

Remember just your lad, uncouthly good,
Forgetting when he failed
in spleen or spite?
Could you remember him as always kind?
THE WEDDED LOVER

I read in our old journals of the days
When our first love was
April-sweet and new,
How fair it blossomed and deep-rooted grew

Despite the adverse time; and our amaze
At moon and stars and
beauty beyond praise
That burgeoned all about us: gold and blue

The heaven arched us in, and all we knew
Was gentleness. We
walked on happy ways.
They said by now the path would be more steep,
The sunsets paler
and less mild the air;
Rightly we heeded not: it was not true.
We
will not tell the secret--let it keep.
I know not how I thought those
days so fair
These being so much fairer, spent with you.
TO YOU, REMEMBERING THE PAST
When we were parted, sweet, and darkness came,
I used to strike a
match, and hold the flame
Before your picture; and would breathless
mark
The answering glimmer of the tiny spark
That brought to life
the magic of your eyes,
Their wistful tenderness, their glad surprise.
Holding that mimic torch before your shrine
I used to light your eyes
and make them mine;
Watch them like stars set in a lonely sky,

Whisper my heart out, yearning for reply;
Summon your lips from far
across the sea
Bidding them live a twilight hour with me.
Then, when the match was shrivelled into gloom,
Lo--you were with
me in the darkened room.
THE LAST SONNET
Suppose one knew that never more might one
Put pen to sonnet, well
loved task; that now
These fourteen lines were all he could allow

To say his message, be forever done;
How he would scan the word,
the line, the rhyme,
Intent to sum in dearly chosen phrase
The
windy trees, the beauty of his days,
Life's pride and pathos in one
verse sublime.
How bitter then would be regret and pang
For

former rhymes he dallied to refine,
For every verse that was not
crystalline....
And if belike this last one feebly rang,
Honour and
pride would cast it to the floor
Facing the judge with what was done
before.
THE WAR
IRONY
Anton Lang, the _Christus_ of Oberammergau, has not been called
upon