Thoughts, Moods and Ideals: Crimes of Leisure | Page 7

thought,
Is the mantle yours, of song?
Why
with hours like this do not
Glorious strains to all belong?
Why all_ choosing, why _all ban?
Why are lords, and why are slaves

And the most of gentle man
Clipt and harried to their graves?

Foiled and ruined, masses die
That one fair and noble be.
Why are
all not Masters? Why
So unjust is Life's decree?
Why are poor and why are rich?
Why are slaves and why are lords?

Unto this the splendid niche:
Those caste damneth in their words.

Do not powers of evil reign?
Do not flashes' storms make dread?

Should not He of Life again
Bring the just peace of the dead?
Oft the Pines, like priests of state,
Have spoke the heavenly word to
man;
So above me as I sate
Æol voices chanting ran:
"For the
Soul is ever great
For the Soul is ever strong;
In the murmurer it
can wait--
In the shortest sight see long.
"Not a yearning but is proof
Thou art yet its aim to own:
Thou the
warp art and the woof,
Not the woof or warp alone.
Couldst thou
drop the lead within
To the bottom of thyself,
All the World--and
God--and Sin--
And Force--and Ages--were that Elf.
"With thy breathing goes all breath,
With thy striving goes all strife,


In thy being, deep as death,
Lies the largeness of all life.
The
world is but thy deepest wish,
The phases thereof are thy dream;

They that hunt or plough or fish
Are of thee the out-turned seam.
"Helpless, thou hast every power,
In thee greatness perfect sleeps--

And thou comest to thy dower,
And thy strength perennial keeps.

Stir the Aeol harp elate!
Make a triumph of its song,
For the Soul is
ever great,
For the Soul is ever strong!"
Rushings cool as of a breeze
Amened to their litany;
In their pure
sky smiled the trees;
And no more was mystery.
Clear I saw the
Soul at work,
All through fair Saint Francis vale,
Beauty-making;
like a dirk
Peering bright amid the mail.
Vital the dark River wound,
Glassy in his cool repose;
Many a
bird-like country, sound
As the Soul-voice upward rose.
Then as in
a glass I knew
_I_ was vale and town and stream,
Shadowed grove
and northern blue
And the stars that 'gan to gleam.
This was I, and all was mine.
Mine--yea, ours--the grace and might,

With the lordship of a line
That laughs at any earthly knight.
Ah,
what music then I heard!
What conceptions then I saw!

Master-thoughts within me stirred,
And there flashed the Master-law.

Next them did the greatest shapes
Of Angelo crowd in a dream:--

Vain the grace that marble drapes;
A village mason's these did
seem.
But--the light from Angelo's eye
That so deeply eager burns
With
its fierce sincerity!--
Ah, the ancient saw returns:
"Greater artist
than his art;"

Meaning: greater yet than he
Is the vast outfeeling
Heart
In him lying like the sea.
With a sudden eagle-stroke
How this truth can lift one wide.
Then
he sees the sublime joke
Of humility and pride;
For the Soul is ever

great,
The one Soul within us all:
One the tone that shakes a state

With the helpless cradle-call.
Yes, that wonder of the Soul
Is the riddle of it all,
And the answer,
and the whole,
Bright with joy that rends the pall.
Brother-man, I
pray you stand,
Hear a minstrel; but the song
If you do not
understand,
Pass and do not do it wrong.
TO CYBEL DEAR.
LOVE-SONG.
Though others plight for pride or gain,
And mix the cup of love;

Theirs be the duller troth, the stain;
Ours the sweet stars approve.

My riches, love, they shall be thou;
My pride, thy love for me:
No
diamond fairer decks a brow
Than thine sincerity.
Though ours be tenements, not towers,
Theirs, lawns and halls of
ease,
Beloved, 'tis heaven, not gold, is ours,
And the realities.
No
sordid wish doth make us one,
But love, love, love.
O surely, surely,
that is done
Which the sweet stars approve.
THE STILL TRYST.
How love transcends our mortal sphere,
And sees again the
spirit-world,
Forgot so daily. Thou art here;--
I know thee,
sweet--though fair impearled
Thy face in a far atmosphere
To others,--hearing in the sea
My love a-crying up to thee.
Thou by the surf, I on the lake:--
Yet in the real world we meet;

And O, for thy endearéd sake,
Love, all I am is at thy feet.
With thy
life let me breathing take,
And through all nature do thou see
My love a-crying up to thee.

And with thine eyes shall I pursue
Yon shower-veils from the sunset
flying,
Blown mid clouds white and lurid-blue
That crowd the
rainbow's arch, defying
Him who in red death shoots them through.
Look with me; in this pageant see
My love all glowing up to thee.
See what I see, hear what I hear,
I too am with thee by the wave--

One all the day, the hour, the year:
Our trust of love shall be so brave,

We shall deny that death is here
Or any power in the grave.
I
know thee; thou canst love like this;
Be ours the endless spirit-kiss.
Dusk falls. How purely shines that star,
Concealed while day was in
the sky;
Life, love and thou not mortal are,
Though atheist noon
your world deny.
Dusk falls:--though in the west a bar
Of bloom on evening's pure cheek be;
In beauty thy love cries to