The Pilgrims of Hope | Page 8

of the blossom of my life!
It would be as sunlit meadows beheld from a tossing sea, And thy soul
should look on a vision of the peace that is to be.
Yet, yet the tears on my cheek! And what is this doth move My heart to
thy heart, beloved, save the flood of yearning love? For fair and fierce
is thy father, and soft and strange are his eyes That look on the days
that shall be with the hope of the brave and the wise. It was many a day
that we laughed as over the meadows we walked, And many a day I
hearkened and the pictures came as he talked; It was many a day that
we longed, and we lingered late at eve Ere speech from speech was
sundered, and my hand his hand could leave. Then I wept when I was
alone, and I longed till the daylight came; And down the stairs I stole,
and there was our housekeeping dame (No mother of me, the foundling)
kindling the fire betimes Ere the haymaking folk went forth to the
meadows down by the limes; All things I saw at a glance; the
quickening fire-tongues leapt Through the crackling heap of sticks, and
the sweet smoke up from it crept, And close to the very hearth the low
sun flooded the floor, And the cat and her kittens played in the sun by
the open door. The garden was fair in the morning, and there in the

road he stood Beyond the crimson daisies and the bush of
southernwood. Then side by side together through the grey-walled
place we went, And O the fear departed, and the rest and sweet content!
Son, sorrow and wisdom he taught me, and sore I grieved and learned
As we twain grew into one; and the heart within me burned With the
very hopes of his heart. Ah, son, it is piteous, But never again in my
life shall I dare to speak to thee thus; So may these lonely words about
thee creep and cling, These words of the lonely night in the days of our
wayfaring. Many a child of woman to-night is born in the town, The
desert of folly and wrong; and of what and whence are they grown?
Many and many an one of wont and use is born; For a husband is taken
to bed as a hat or a ribbon is worn. Prudence begets her thousands:
"Good is a housekeeper's life, So shall I sell my body that I may be
matron and wife." "And I shall endure foul wedlock and bear the
children of need." Some are there born of hate--many the children of
greed. "I, I too can be wedded, though thou my love hast got." "I am
fair and hard of heart, and riches shall be my lot." And all these are the
good and the happy, on whom the world dawns fair. O son, when wilt
thou learn of those that are born of despair, As the fabled mud of the
Nile that quickens under the sun With a growth of creeping things, half
dead when just begun? E'en such is the care of Nature that man should
never die, Though she breed of the fools of the earth, and the dregs of
the city sty. But thou, O son, O son, of very love wert born, When our
hope fulfilled bred hope, and fear was a folly outworn; On the eve of
the toil and the battle all sorrow and grief we weighed, We hoped and
we were not ashamed, we knew and we were not afraid.
Now waneth the night and the moon--ah, son, it is piteous That never
again in my life shall I dare to speak to thee thus. But sure from the
wise and the simple shall the mighty come to birth; And fair were my
fate, beloved, if I be yet on the earth When the world is awaken at last,
and from mouth to mouth they tell Of thy love and thy deeds and thy
valour, and thy hope that nought can quell.

NEW BIRTH

It was twenty-five years ago that I lay in my mother's lap New born to
life, nor knowing one whit of all that should hap: That day was I won

from nothing to the world of struggle and pain, Twenty-five years
ago--and to-night am I born again.
I look and behold the days of the years that are passed away, And my
soul is full of their wealth, for oft were they blithe and gay As the hours
of bird and of beast: they have made me calm and strong To wade the
stream of confusion, the river of grief and wrong.
A rich man