Chapter IV

'Tis not a vision only--we who pay
But the poor tribute of our praises here
Are equal sharers in the guerdon they
Purchased at price so dear.

The angel, Peace, o'er all uplifts her hand,
Waving the olive, and with heavenly eyes
Shedding a light of love o'er sea and land
As sunshine from the skies--

Her figure pedestalled on Freedom's soil--
Her sandals kissed with seas of golden grain--
Queen of a realm of joy-requited toil
That glories in her reign.

O blessed land of labor and reward!
O gracious Ruler, let Thy reign endure;
In pruning-hook and ploughshare beat the sword,
And reap the harvest sure!

SHADOW AND SHINE

Storms of the winter, and deepening snows,
When will you end? I said,
For the soul within me was numb with woes,
And my heart uncomforted.
When will you cease, O dismal days?
When will you set me free?
For the frozen world and its desolate ways
Are all unloved of me!

I waited long, but the answer came--
The kiss of the sunshine lay
Warm as a flame on the lips that frame
The song in my heart to-day.
Blossoms of summer-time waved in the air,
Glimmers of sun in the sea;
Fair thoughts followed me everywhere,
And the world was dear to me.

THAT NIGHT

You and I, and that night, with its perfume and glory!--
The scent of the locusts--the light of the moon;
And the violin weaving the waltzers a story,
Enmeshing their feet in the weft of the tune,
Till their shadows uncertain
Reeled round on the curtain,
While under the trellis we drank in the June.

Soaked through with the midnight the cedars were sleeping,
Their shadowy tresses outlined in the bright
Crystal, moon-smitten mists, where the fountain's heart, leaping
Forever, forever burst, full with delight;
And its lisp on my spirit
Fell faint as that near it
Whose love like a lily bloomed out in the night.

O your love was an odorous sachet of blisses!
The breath of your fan was a breeze from Cathay!
And the rose at your throat was a nest of spilled kisses!--
And the music!--in fancy I hear it to-day,
As I sit here, confessing
Our secret, and blessing
My rival who found us, and waltzed you away.

AUGUST

O mellow month and merry month,
Let me make love to you,
And follow you around the world
As knights their ladies do.
I thought your sisters beautiful,
Both May and April, too,
But April she had rainy eyes,
And May had eyes of blue.

And June--I liked the singing
Of her lips--and liked her smile--
But all her songs were promises
Of something, after while;
And July's face--the lights and shades
That may not long beguile
With alterations o'er the wheat
The dreamer at the stile.

But you!--ah, you are tropical,
Your beauty is so rare;
Your eyes are clearer, deeper eyes
Than any, anywhere;
Mysterious, imperious,
Deliriously fair,
O listless Andalusian maid,
With bangles in your hair!

THE GUIDE

IMITATED

We rode across the level plain--
We--my sagacious guide and I.--
He knew the earth--the air--the sky;
He knew when it would blow or rain,
And when the weather would be dry:
The blended blades of grass spake out
To him when Redskins were about;
The wagon tracks would tell him too,
The very day that they rolled through:
He knew their burden--whence they came--
If any horse along were lame,
And what its owner ought to do;
He knew when it would snow; he knew,
By some strange intuition, when
The buffalo would overflow
The prairies like a flood, and then
Recede in their stampede again.
He knew all things--yea, he did know
The brand of liquor in my flask,
And many times did tilt it up,
Nor halt or hesitate one whit,
Nor pause to slip the silver cup
From off its crystal base, nor ask
Why I preferred to drink from it.
And more and more I plied him, and
Did query of him o'er and o'er,
And seek to lure from him the lore
By which the man did understand
These hidden things of sky and land:
And, wrought upon, he sudden drew
His bridle--wheeled, and caught my hand--
Pressed it, as one that loved me true,
And bade me listen.
................... There be few
Like tales as strange to listen to!
He told me all--How, when a child,
The Indians stole him--there he laughed--
"They stole me, and I stole their craft!"
Then slowly winked both eyes, and smiled,
And went on ramblingly,--"And they--
They reared me, and I ran away--
'Twas winter, and the weather wild;
And, caught up in the awful snows
That bury wilderness and plain,
I struggled on until I froze
My feet ere human hands again
Were reached to me in my distress,--
And lo, since then not any rain
May fall upon me anywhere,
Nor any cyclone's cussedness
Slip up behind me unaware,--
Nor any change of cold, or heat,
Or blow, or snow, but I do know
It's coming, days and days before;--
I know it by my frozen feet--
I know it by my itching heels,
And by the agony one feels
Who knows that scratching nevermore
Will bring to him the old and sweet
Relief he knew ere thus endowed
With knowledge that a certain cloud
Will burst with storm on such a day,
And when a snow will fall, and--nay,
I speak not falsely when I say
That by my tingling heels and toes
I measure time, and can disclose
The date of month--the week--and lo,
The very day and minute--yea--
Look at your watch!--An hour ago
And twenty minutes I did say
Unto myself with bitter laugh,
'In less than one hour and a half
Will I be drunken!' Is it so?"

SUTTER'S CLAIM

IMITATED

Say! _you_ feller! _You_--
With that spade and the pick!--
What do you 'pose to do
On this side o' the crick?
Goin' to tackle this claim? Well, I reckon
You'll let up ag'in, purty quick!

No bluff, understand,--
But the same has been tried,
And the claim never panned--
Or the fellers has lied,--
For they tell of a dozen that tried it,
And quit it most onsatisfied.

The luck's dead ag'in it!--
The first man I see
That stuck a pick in it
Proved _that_ thing to me,--
For he sort o' took down, and got homesick,
And went back whar he'd orto be!

Then others they worked it
Some--more or less,
But finally shirked it,
In grades of distress,--
With an eye out--a jaw or skull busted,
Or some sort o' seriousness.

The _last_ one was plucky--
He wasn't afeerd,
And bragged he was "lucky,"
And said that "he'd heerd
A heap of bluff-talk," and swore awkard
He'd work any claim that he keered!

Don't you strike nary lick
With that pick till I'm through;
This-here feller talked slick
And as peart-like as you!
And he says: "I'll abide here
As long as I please!"
But he didn't.... He died here--
And I'm his disease!

HER LIGHT GUITAR

She twankled a tune on her light guitar--
A low, sweet jangle of tangled sounds,
As blurred as the voices of the fairies are,
Dancing in moondawn dales and downs;
And the tinkling drip of the strange refrain
Ran over the rim of my soul like rain.

The great blond moon in the midnight skies
Paused and poised o'er the trellis eaves,
And the stars, in the light of her upturned eyes,
Sifted their love through the rifted leaves,
Glittered and splintered in crystal mist
Down the glittering strings that her fingers kissed.

O the melody mad! O the tinkle and thrill
Of the ecstasy of the exquisite thing!
The red rose dropped from the window-sill
And lay in a long swoon quivering;
While the dying notes of the strain divine
Rippled in glee up my spellbound spine.

WHILE CIGARETTES TO ASHES TURN

I

"He smokes--and that's enough," says Ma--
"And cigarettes, at that!" says Pa.

"He must not call again," says she--
"He _shall_ not call again!" says he.

They both glare at me as before--
Then quit the room and bang the door.--

While I, their wilful daughter, say,
"I guess I'll love him, anyway!"

II

At twilight, in his room, alone,
His careless feet inertly thrown

Across a chair, my fancy can
But worship this most worthless man!

I dream what joy it is to set
His slow lips round a cigarette,

With idle-humored whiff and puff--
Ah! this is innocent enough!

To mark the slender fingers raise
The waxen match's dainty blaze,

Whose chastened light an instant glows
On drooping lids and arching nose,

Then, in the sudden gloom, instead,
A tiny ember, dim and red,

Blooms languidly to ripeness, then
Fades slowly, and grows ripe again.