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

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 me.
THE CHICKIEBIDS.
The chickiebids are in their nest
Overhead,--?Dimpled shapes of rosy rest
Curled a-bed.?Night has sung her spell, and thrown
Her dark net round?Their heads; their pearly ears have grown
Deaf to all other sound.
O of me how you are part,
Babies mine!?Your hearts are children of my heart.
The inner sign?Of my eyes lurks in your eyes,
And your soul,?That so brims with Paradise,
Stirs what wonders roll?Unsuspected in myself,
Who had thought?Life half death, till childhood's elf--
Sign of angels men shall be--?Came and taught?A youth eterne within futurity.
THE CAUGHNAWAGA BEADWORK SELLER.
Kanawaki--"By the Rapid,"--?Low the sunset midst thee lies;?And from the wild Reservation?Evening's breeze begins to rise.?Faint the K?noronkwa chorus?Drifts across the current strong;?Spirit-like the parish steeple?Stands thy ancient walls among.
Kanawaki--"By the Rapid,"--?How the sun amidst thee burns!?Village of the Praying Nation,?Thy dark child to thee returns.?All day through the pale-face city,?Silent, selling beaded wares,?I have wandered with my basket,?Lone, excepting for their stares!
They are white men; we are Indians;?What a gulf their stares proclaim!?They are mounting; we are dying;?All our heritage they claim.?We are dying, dwindling, dying,?Strait and smaller grows our bound;?They are mounting up to heaven?And are pressing all around.
Thou art ours,--little remnant,?Ours through countless