Chapter II

Impregnable I held myself, secure Against intrusion. Who can measure Man? How should I guess his mortal will outran Defeat so far that danger could allure For its own sake? -- that he would all endure, All sacrifice, all suffer, rather than Forego the daring dreams Olympian That prophesy to him of victory sure?

Ah, tameless courage! -- dominating power That, all attempting, in a deathless hour Made earth-born Titans godlike, in revolt! -- Fear is the fire that melts Icarian wings: Who fears nor Fate, nor Time, nor what Time brings, May drive Apollo's steeds, or wield the thunderbolt!

The Happiest Heart. [John Vance Cheney]

Who drives the horses of the sun Shall lord it but a day; Better the lowly deed were done, And kept the humble way.

The rust will find the sword of fame, The dust will hide the crown; Ay, none shall nail so high his name Time will not tear it down.

The happiest heart that ever beat Was in some quiet breast That found the common daylight sweet, And left to Heaven the rest.

To a New York Shop-Girl dressed for Sunday. [Anna Hempstead Branch]

To-day I saw the shop-girl go Down gay Broadway to meet her beau.

Conspicuous, splendid, conscious, sweet, She spread abroad and took the street.

And all that niceness would forbid, Superb, she smiled upon and did.

Let other girls, whose happier days Preserve the perfume of their ways,

Go modestly. The passing hour Adds splendor to their opening flower.

But from this child too swift a doom Must steal her prettiness and bloom,

Toil and weariness hide the grace That pleads a moment from her face.

So blame her not if for a day She flaunts her glories while she may.

She half perceives, half understands, Snatching her gifts with both her hands.

The little strut beneath the skirt That lags neglected in the dirt,

The indolent swagger down the street -- Who can condemn such happy feet!

Innocent! vulgar -- that's the truth! Yet with the darling wiles of youth!

The bright, self-conscious eyes that stare With such hauteur, beneath such hair! ~Perhaps the men will find me fair!~

Charming and charmed, flippant, arrayed, Fluttered and foolish, proud, displayed, Infinite pathos of parade!

The bangles and the narrowed waist -- The tinsled boa -- forgive the taste! Oh, the starved nights she gave for that, And bartered bread to buy her hat!

She flows before the reproachful sage And begs her woman's heritage.

Dear child, with the defiant eyes, Insolent with the half surmise We do not quite admire, I know How foresight frowns on this vain show!

And judgment, wearily sad, may see No grace in such frivolity.

Yet which of us was ever bold To worship Beauty, hungry and cold!

Scorn famine down, proudly expressed Apostle to what things are best.

Let him who starves to buy the food For his soul's comfort find her good,

Nor chide the frills and furbelows That are the prettiest things she knows.

Poet and prophet in God's eyes Make no more perfect sacrifice.

Who knows before what inner shrine She eats with them the bread and wine?

Poor waif! One of the sacred few That madly sought the best they knew!

Dear -- let me lean my cheek to-night Close, close to yours. Ah, that is right.

How warm and near! At last I see One beauty shines for thee and me.

So let us love and understand -- Whose hearts are hidden in God's hand.

And we will cherish your brief Spring And all its fragile flowering.

God loves all prettiness, and on this Surely his angels lay their kiss.

A Faun in Wall Street. [John Myers O'Hara]

What shape so furtive steals along the dim Bleak street, barren of throngs, this day of June; This day of rest, when all the roses swoon In Attic vales where dryads wait for him? What sylvan this, and what the stranger whim That lured him here this golden afternoon; Ways where the dusk has fallen oversoon In the deep canyon, torrentless and grim?

Great Pan is far, O mad estray, and these Bare walls that leap to heaven and hide the skies Are fanes men rear to other deities; Far to the east the haunted woodland lies, And cloudless still, from cyclad-dotted seas, Hymettus and the hills of Hellas rise.

The Mystic. [Witter Bynner]

By seven vineyards on one hill We walked. The native wine In clusters grew beside us two, For your lips and for mine,

When, "Hark!" you said, -- "Was that a bell Or a bubbling spring we heard?" But I was wise and closed my eyes And listened to a bird;

For as summer leaves are bent and shake With singers passing through, So moves in me continually The winged breath of you.

You tasted from a single vine And took from that your fill -- But I inclined to every kind, All seven on one hill.

The Cloud. [Josephine Preston Peabody]

The islands called me far away, The valleys called me home. The rivers with a silver voice Drew on my heart to come.

The paths reached tendrils to my hair From every vine and tree. There was no refuge anywhere Until I came to thee.

There is a northern cloud I know, Along a mountain crest; And as she folds her wings of mist, So I could make my rest.

There is no chain to bind her so Unto that purple height; And she will shine and wander, slow, Slow, with a cloud's delight.

Would she begone? She melts away, A heavenly joyous thing. Yet day will find the mountain white, White-folded with her wing.

As you may see, but half aware If it be late or soon, Soft breathing on the day-time air, The fair forgotten Moon.

And though love cannot bind me, Love, -- Ah no! -- yet I could stay Maybe, with wings forever spread, -- Forever, and a day.

The Thought of her. [Richard Hovey]

My love for thee doth take me unaware, When most with lesser things my brain is wrought, As in some nimble interchange of thought The silence enters, and the talkers stare. Suddenly I am still and thou art there, A viewless visitant and unbesought, And all my thinking trembles into nought And all my being opens like a prayer. Thou art the lifted Chalice in my soul, And I a dim church at the thought of thee; Brief be the moment, but the mass is said, The benediction like an aureole Is on my spirit, and shuddering through me A rapture like the rapture of the dead.

Song. "If love were but a little thing --". [Florence Earle Coates]

If love were but a little thing -- Strange love, which, more than all, is great -- One might not such devotion bring, Early to serve and late.

If love were but a passing breath -- Wild love -- which, as God knows, is sweet -- One might not make of life and death A pillow for love's feet.

The Rosary. [Robert Cameron Rogers]

The hours I spent with thee, dear heart, Are as a string of pearls to me; I count them over, every one apart, My rosary.

Each hour a pearl, each pearl a prayer, To still a heart in absence wrung; I tell each bead unto the end -- and there A cross is hung.

Oh, memories that bless -- and burn!
Oh, barren gain -- and bitter loss!
I kiss each bead, and strive at last to learn
To kiss the cross,
Sweetheart,
To kiss the cross.

Once. [Trumbull Stickney]

That day her eyes were deep as night. She had the motion of the rose, The bird that veers across the light, The waterfall that leaps and throws Its irised spindrift to the sun. She seemed a wind of music passing on.

Alone I saw her that one day Stand in the window of my life. Her sudden hand melted away Under my lips, and without strife I held her in my arms awhile And drew into my lips her living smile, --

Now many a day ago and year! Since when I dream and lie awake In summer nights to feel her near, And from the heavy darkness break Glitters, till all my spirit swims And her hand hovers on my shaking limbs.

If once again before I die I drank the laughter of her mouth And quenched my fever utterly, I say, and should it cost my youth, 'T were well! for I no more should wait Hammering midnight on the doors of fate.

Love knocks at the Door. [John Hall Wheelock]

In the pain, in the loneliness of love, To the heart of my sweet I fled. I knocked at the door of her living heart, "Let in -- let in --" I said.

"What seek you here?" the voices cried, "You seeker among the dead" -- "Herself I seek, herself I seek, Let in -- let in!" I said.

They opened the door of her living heart, But the core thereof was dead. They opened the core of her living heart -- A worm at the core there fed.

"Where is my sweet, where is my sweet?" "She is gone away, she is fled. Long years ago she fled away, She will never return," they said.

The Candle and the Flame. [George Sylvester Viereck]

Thy hands are like cool herbs that bring Balm to men's hearts, upon them laid; Thy lovely-petalled lips are made As any blossom of the spring. But in thine eyes there is a thing, O Love, that makes me half afraid.

For they are old, those eyes . . . They gleam Between the waking and the dream With antique wisdom, like a bright Lamp strangled by the temple's veil, That beckons to the acolyte Who prays with trembling lips and pale In the long watches of the night.

They are as old as Life. They were When proud Gomorrah reared its head A new-born city. They were there When in the places of the dead Men swathed the body of the Lord. They visioned Pa-wak raise the wall Of China. They saw Carthage fall And marked the grim Hun lead his horde.

There is no secret anywhere Nor any joy or shame that lies Not writ somehow in those child-eyes Of thine, O Love, in some strange wise. Thou art the lad Endymion, And that great queen with spice and myrrh From Araby, whom Solomon Delighted, and the lust of her.

The legions marching from the sea With Caesar's cohorts sang of thee, How thy fair head was more to him Than all the land of Italy. Yea, in the old days thou wast she Who lured Mark Antony from home To death and Egypt, seeing he Lost love when he lost Rome.

Thou saw'st old Tubal strike the lyre, Yea, first for thee the poet hurled Defiance at God's starry choir! Thou art the romance and the fire, Thou art the pageant and the strife, The clamour, mounting high and higher, From all the lovers in the world To all the lords of love and life.

. . . . .

Perhaps the passions of mankind Are but the torches mystical Lit by some spirit-hand to find The dwelling of the Master-Mind That knows the secret of it all, In the great darkness and the wind.

We are the Candle, Love the Flame, Each little life-light flickers out, Love bides, immortally the same: When of life's fever we shall tire He will desert us and the fire Rekindle new in prince or lout.

Twin-born of knowledge and of lust, He was before us, he shall be Indifferent still of thee and me, When shattered is life's golden cup, When thy young limbs are shrivelled up, And when my heart is turned to dust.

Nay, sweet, smile not to know at last That thou and I, or knave, or fool, Are but the involitient tool Of some world-purpose vague and vast. No bar to passion's fury set, With monstrous poppies spice the wine: For only drunk are we divine, And only mad shall we forget!

Stains. [Theodosia Garrison]

The three ghosts on the lonesome road Spake each to one another, "Whence came that stain about your mouth No lifted hand may cover?" "From eating of forbidden fruit, Brother, my brother."

The three ghosts on the sunless road Spake each to one another, "Whence came that red burn on your foot No dust nor ash may cover?" "I stamped a neighbor's hearth-flame out, Brother, my brother."

The three ghosts on the windless road Spake each to one another, "Whence came that blood upon your hand No other hand may cover?" "From breaking of a woman's heart, Brother, my brother."

"Yet on the earth clean men we walked, Glutton and Thief and Lover; White flesh and fair it hid our stains That no man might discover." "Naked the soul goes up to God, Brother, my brother."

De Massa ob de Sheepfol'. [Sarah Pratt McLean Greene]

De massa ob de sheepfol' Dat guard de sheepfol' bin, Look out in de gloomerin' meadows Whar de long night rain begin -- So he call to de hirelin' shephe'd: "Is my sheep -- is dey all come in?"

Oh den, says de hirelin' shephe'd, "Dey's some, dey's black and thin, And some, dey's po' ol' wedda's -- But de res', dey's all brung in. But de res', dey's all brung in."

Den de massa ob de sheepfol' Dat guard de sheepfol' bin, Goes down in de gloomerin' meadows Whar de long night rain begin -- So he le' down de ba's ob de sheepfol', Callin' sof': "Come in! Come in!" Callin' sof': "Come in! Come in!"

Den up t'ro de gloomerin' meadows, T'ro de col' night rain an' win', An' up t'ro de gloomerin' rain-paf Whar de sleet fa' piercin' thin -- De po' los' sheep ob de sheepfol' Dey all comes gadderin' in. De po' los' sheep ob de sheepfol', Dey all comes gadderin' in!

Black Sheep. [Richard Burton]

From their folded mates they wander far, Their ways seem harsh and wild; They follow the beck of a baleful star, Their paths are dream-beguiled.

Yet haply they sought but a wider range, Some loftier mountain-slope, And little recked of the country strange Beyond the gates of hope.

And haply a bell with a luring call Summoned their feet to tread Midst the cruel rocks, where the deep pitfall And the lurking snare are spread.

Maybe, in spite of their tameless days Of outcast liberty, They're sick at heart for the homely ways Where their gathered brothers be.

And oft at night, when the plains fall dark And the hills loom large and dim, For the Shepherd's voice they mutely hark, And their souls go out to him.

Meanwhile, "Black sheep! Black sheep!" we cry, Safe in the inner fold; And maybe they hear, and wonder why, And marvel, out in the cold.

Let me no more a Mendicant. [Arthur Colton]

Let me no more a mendicant Without the gate Of the world's kingly palace wait; Morning is spent, The sentinels change and challenge in the tower, Now slant the shadows eastward hour by hour.

Open the door, O Seneschal! Within I see them sit, The feasters, daring destiny with wit, Casting to win Or lose their utmost, and men hurry by At offices of confluent energy.

Let me not here a mendicant Without the gate Linger from dayspring till the night is late, And there are sent All homeless stars to loiter in the sky, And beggared midnight winds to wander by.

Lincoln, the Man of the People. [Edwin Markham]

When the Norn Mother saw the Whirlwind Hour Greatening and darkening as it hurried on, She left the Heaven of Heroes and came down To make a man to meet the mortal need. She took the tried clay of the common road -- Clay warm yet with the genial heat of Earth, Dashed through it all a strain of prophecy; Tempered the heap with thrill of human tears; Then mixed a laughter with the serious stuff. Into the shape she breathed a flame to light That tender, tragic, ever-changing face. Here was a man to hold against the world, A man to match the mountains and the sea.

The color of the ground was in him, the red earth; The smack and tang of elemental things; The rectitude and patience of the cliff; The good-will of the rain that loves all leaves; The friendly welcome of the wayside well; The courage of the bird that dares the sea; The gladness of the wind that shakes the corn; The pity of the snow that hides all scars; The secrecy of streams that make their way Beneath the mountain to the rifted rock; The tolerance and equity of light That gives as freely to the shrinking flower As to the great oak flaring to the wind -- To the grave's low hill as to the Matterhorn That shoulders out the sky.

Sprung from the West, The strength of virgin forests braced his mind, The hush of spacious prairies stilled his soul. Up from log cabin to the Capitol, One fire was on his spirit, one resolve -- To send the keen ax to the root of wrong, Clearing a free way for the feet of God. And evermore he burned to do his deed With the fine stroke and gesture of a king: He built the rail-pile as he built the State, Pouring his splendid strength through every blow, The conscience of him testing every stroke, To make his deed the measure of a man.

So came the Captain with the mighty heart; And when the judgment thunders split the house, Wrenching the rafters from their ancient rest, He held the ridgepole up, and spiked again The rafters of the Home. He held his place -- Held the long purpose like a growing tree -- Held on through blame and faltered not at praise. And when he fell in whirlwind, he went down As when a lordly cedar, green with boughs, Goes down with a great shout upon the hills, And leaves a lonesome place against the sky.

The Master. [Edwin Arlington Robinson]

(Lincoln)

A flying word from here and there Had sown the name at which we sneered, But soon the name was everywhere, To be reviled and then revered: A presence to be loved and feared, We cannot hide it, or deny That we, the gentlemen who jeered, May be forgotten by and by.

He came when days were perilous And hearts of men were sore beguiled; And having made his note of us, He pondered and was reconciled. Was ever master yet so mild As he, and so untamable? We doubted, even when he smiled, Not knowing what he knew so well.

He knew that undeceiving fate Would shame us whom he served unsought; He knew that he must wince and wait -- The jest of those for whom he fought; He knew devoutly what he thought Of us and of our ridicule; He knew that we must all be taught Like little children in a school.

We gave a glamour to the task That he encountered and saw through, But little of us did he ask, And little did we ever do. And what appears if we review The season when we railed and chaffed? It is the face of one who knew That we were learning while we laughed.

The face that in our vision feels Again the venom that we flung, Transfigured to the world reveals The vigilance to which we clung. Shrewd, hallowed, harassed, and among The mysteries that are untold, The face we see was never young, Nor could it ever have been old.

For he, to whom we have applied Our shopman's test of age and worth, Was elemental when he died, As he was ancient at his birth: The saddest among kings of earth, Bowed with a galling crown, this man Met rancor with a cryptic mirth, Laconic -- and Olympian.

The love, the grandeur, and the fame Are bounded by the world alone; The calm, the smouldering, and the flame Of awful patience were his own: With him they are forever flown Past all our fond self-shadowings, Wherewith we cumber the Unknown As with inept Icarian wings.

For we were not as other men: 'T was ours to soar and his to see. But we are coming down again, And we shall come down pleasantly; Nor shall we longer disagree On what it is to be sublime, But flourish in our perigee And have one Titan at a time.

On the Building of Springfield. [Nicholas Vachel Lindsay]

Let not our town be large -- remembering That little Athens was the Muses' home; That Oxford rules the heart of London still, That Florence gave the Renaissance to Rome.

Record it for the grandson of your son -- A city is not builded in a day: Our little town cannot complete her soul Till countless generations pass away.

Now let each child be joined as to a church To her perpetual hopes, each man ordained; Let every street be made a reverent aisle Where music grows, and beauty is unchained.

Let Science and Machinery and Trade Be slaves of her, and make her all in all -- Building against our blatant restless time An unseen, skillful, mediaeval wall.

Let every citizen be rich toward God. Let Christ, the beggar, teach divinity -- Let no man rule who holds his money dear. Let this, our city, be our luxury.

We should build parks that students from afar Would choose to starve in, rather than go home -- Fair little squares, with Phidian ornament -- Food for the spirit, milk and honeycomb.

Songs shall be sung by us in that good day -- Songs we have written -- blood within the rhyme Beating, as when old England still was glad, The purple, rich, Elizabethan time.

Say, is my prophecy too fair and far? I only know, unless her faith be high, The soul of this our Nineveh is doomed, Our little Babylon will surely die.

Some city on the breast of Illinois No wiser and no better at the start, By faith shall rise redeemed -- by faith shall rise Bearing the western glory in her heart --

The genius of the Maple, Elm and Oak, The secret hidden in each grain of corn -- The glory that the prairie angels sing At night when sons of Life and Love are born --

Born but to struggle, squalid and alone, Broken and wandering in their early years. When will they make our dusty streets their goal, Within our attics hide their sacred tears?

When will they start our vulgar blood athrill With living language -- words that set us free? When will they make a path of beauty clear Between our riches and our liberty?

We must have many Lincoln-hearted men -- A city is not builded in a day -- And they must do their work, and come and go While countless generations pass away.

The Poet's Town. [John G. Neihardt]

I

'Mid glad green miles of tillage And fields where cattle graze, A prosy little village, You drowse away the days.

And yet -- a wakeful glory Clings round you as you doze; One living lyric story Makes music of your prose.

Here once, returning never, The feet of song have trod; And flashed -- Oh, once forever! -- The singing Flame of God.

II

These were his fields Elysian: With mystic eyes he saw The sowers planting vision, The reapers gleaning awe.

Serfs to a sordid duty, He saw them with his heart, Priests of the Ultimate Beauty, Feeding the flame of art.

The weird, untempled Makers Pulsed in the things he saw; The wheat through its virile acres Billowed the Song of Law.

The epic roll of the furrow Flung from the writing plow, The dactyl phrase of the green-rowed maize Measured the music of Now.

III

Sipper of ancient flagons, Often the lonesome boy Saw in the farmers' wagons The chariots hurled at Troy.

Trundling in dust and thunder They rumbled up and down, Laden with princely plunder, Loot of the tragic Town.

And once when the rich man's daughter Smiled on the boy at play, Sword-storms, giddy with slaughter, Swept back the ancient day!

War steeds shrieked in the quiet, Far and hoarse were the cries; And Oh, through the din and the riot, The music of Helen's eyes!

Stabbed with the olden Sorrow, He slunk away from the play, For the Past and the vast To-morrow Were wedded in his To-day.

IV

Rich with the dreamer's pillage, An idle and worthless lad, Least in a prosy village, And prince in Allahabad;

Lover of golden apples, Munching a daily crust; Haunter of dream-built chapels, Worshipping in the dust;

Dull to the worldly duty, Less to the town he grew, And more to the God of Beauty Than even the grocer knew!

V

Corn for the buyers, and cattle -- But what could the dreamer sell? Echoes of cloudy battle? Music from heaven and hell?

Spices and bales of plunder Argosied over the sea? Tapestry woven of wonder, And myrrh from Araby?

None of your dream-stuffs, Fellow, Looter of Samarcand! Gold is heavy and yellow, And value is weighed in the hand!

VI

And yet, when the years had humbled The Kings in the Realm of the Boy, Song-built bastions crumbled, Ash-heaps smothering Troy;

Thirsting for shattered flagons, Quaffing a brackish cup, With all of his chariots, wagons -- He never could quite grow up.

The debt to the ogre, To-morrow, He never could comprehend: Why should the borrowers borrow? Why should the lenders lend?

Never an oak tree borrowed, But took for its needs -- and gave. Never an oak tree sorrowed; Debt was the mark of the slave.

Grass in the priceless weather Sucked from the paps of the Earth, And the hills that were lean it fleshed with green -- Oh, what is a lesson worth?

But still did the buyers barter And the sellers squint at the scales; And price was the stake of the martyr, And cost was the lock of the jails.

VII

Windflowers herald the Maytide, Rendering worth for worth; Ragweeds gladden the wayside, Biting the dugs of the Earth;

Violets, scattering glories, Feed from the dewy gem: But dreamers are fed by the living and dead -- And what is the gift from them?

VIII

Never a stalk of the Summer Dreams of its mission and doom: Only to hasten the Comer -- Martyrdom unto the Bloom.

Ever the Mighty Chooser Plucks when the fruit is ripe, Scorning the mass and letting it pass, Keen for the cryptic type.

Greece in her growing season Troubled the lands and seas, Plotted and fought and suffered and wrought -- Building a Sophocles!

Only a faultless temple Stands for the vassal's groan; The harlot's strife and the faith of the wife Blend in a graven stone.

Ne'er do the stern gods cherish The hope of the million lives; Always the Fact shall perish And only the Truth survives.

Gardens of roses wither, Shaping the perfect rose: And the poet's song shall live for the long, Dumb, aching years of prose.

IX

King of a Realm of Magic, He was the fool of the town, Hiding the ache of the tragic Under the grin of the clown.

Worn with the vain endeavor To fit in the sordid plan; Doomed to be poet forever, He longed to be only a man;

To be freed from the god's enthralling, Back with the reeds of the stream; Deaf to the Vision calling, And dead to the lash of the Dream.

X

But still did the Mighty Makers Stir in the common sod; The corn through its awful acres Trembled and thrilled with God!

More than a man was the sower, Lured by a man's desire, For a triune Bride walked close at his side -- Dew and Dust and Fire!

More than a man was the plowman, Shouting his gee and haw; For a something dim kept pace with him, And ever the poet saw;

Till the winds of the cosmic struggle Made of his flesh a flute, To echo the tune of a whirlwind rune Unto the million mute.

XI

Son of the Mother of mothers, The womb and the tomb of Life, With Fire and Air for brothers And a clinging Dream for a wife;

Ever the soul of the dreamer Strove with its mortal mesh, And the lean flame grew till it fretted through The last thin links of flesh.

Oh, rending the veil asunder, He fled to mingle again With the dred Orestean thunder, The Lear of the driven rain!

XII

Once in a cycle the comet Doubles its lonesome track. Enriched with the tears of a thousand years, Aeschylus wanders back.

Ever inweaving, returning, The near grows out of the far; And Homer shall sing once more in a swing Of the austere Polar Star.

Then what of the lonesome dreamer With the lean blue flame in his breast? And who was your clown for a day, O Town, The strange, unbidden guest?