The Singing Man | Page 9

outgrown!

High as I may, I lift thee, Soul's Desire.
--Lift thou me higher.
_And thou, Wayfaring Woman, whom I meet

On all the
highways,--every brimming street,
Lady Demeter, is it thou, grown
gaunt
With work and want?
At last, and with what shamed and
stricken eyes,
I see through thy disguise
Of drudge and Exile,--even
the holy boon
That silvers yonder in the Harvest-moon;--
That
dimly under glows
The furrows of thy worn immortal face,
With

mother-grace._
_O Queen and Burden-bearer, what of those
To whom thou gavest
the lily and the rose
Of thy far youth?... For whom,
Out of the
wondrous loom
Of thine enduring body, thou didst make
Garments
of beauty, cunningly adorned,
But only for Death's sake!
Largess of
life, but to lie waste and scorned.--
Could not such cost of pain,
Nor
daily utmost of thy toil prevail?--
But they must fade, and pale,
And
wither from thy desolated throne?--
And still no Summer give thee
back again
Thine own?_
_Lady of Sorrows,--Mother,--Drudge august.
Behold me in the dust._
GLADNESS
Unto my Gladness then I cried:
'I will not be denied!
Answer me now; and tell me why
Thou dost
not fall, as a broken star
Out of the Dark where such things are,

And where such bright things die.
How canst thou, with thy fountain
dance
Shatter clear sight with radiance?--
How canst thou reach and
soar, and fling,
Over my heart's dark shuddering,
Unearthly lights
on everything?
What dost thou see? What dost thou know?'
My
Gladness said to me, bowed below,
'Gladness I am: created so.'
'And dare'st thou, in my mortal veins
Sing, with the Spring's
descending rains?
While in this hour, and momently,
Forth of
myself I look, and see
Torn treasure of my heart's Desire;
And
human glories in the mire,
That should make glad some paradise!--

The childhood strewn in foulest place,
The girlhood, plundered of its
grace;
The eyelids shut upon spent eyes
That never looked upon thy
face!
Answer me, thou, if answer be!'
My Gladness said to me:

'Weep if thou wilt; yea, weep, and doubt.
I
may not let the Sun go out.'

Then to my Gladness still I cried:
'And how canst thou abide?--'
Here, where my listening heart must
hark
These sorrows rising from the Dark
Where still they starve,
and strive and die,
Who bear each heaviest penalty
Of
humanhood;--nor grasp, nor guess,
The garment's hem of
happiness!--
The spear-wound throbbing in my song,
It throbs more
bitterly than wrong,--
It burns more wildly than despair,--
The will
to share,
The will to share!
Little I knew,--the blind-fold I,--
Joy
would become like agony,--
Like arrows of the Sun in me!

I hold thee here. I have thee, now,--
And I am human. But what art
thou!'
My Gladness answered me:
'Wayfarer, wilt thou understand?--

Follow me on. And keep my hand.'
THE NIGHTINGALE UNHEARD
Yes, Nightingale, through all the summer-time
We followed on, from
moon to golden moon;
From where Salerno day-dreams in the noon,

And the far rose of Pæstum once did climb.
All the white way
beside the girdling blue,
Through sun-shrill vines and campanile
chime,
We listened;--from the old year to the new.
Brown bird, and
where were you?
You, that Ravello lured not, throned on high
And filled with singing
out of sun-burned throats!
Nor yet Minore of the flame-sailed boats;

Nor yet--of all bird-song should glorify--
Assisi, Little Portion of
the blest,
Assisi, in the bosom of the sky,
Where God's own singer
thatched his sunward nest;
That little, heavenliest!
And north and north, to where the hedge-rows are,
That beckon with
white looks an endless way;
Where, through the fair wet silverness of

May,
A lamb shines out as sudden as a star,
Among the cloudy
sheep; and green, and pale,
The may-trees reach and glimmer, near or
far,
And the red may-trees wear a shining veil.
--And still, no
nightingale!
The one vain longing,--through all journeyings,
The one: in every
hushed and hearkening spot,--
All the soft-swarming dark where you
were not,
Still longed for! Yes, for sake of dreams and wings,
And
wonders, that your own must ever make
To bower you close, with all
hearts' treasurings;
And for that speech toward which all hearts do
ache;--
Even for Music's sake.
But most, his music whose belovèd name

Forever writ in water of bright tears,
Wins to one grave-side even the
Roman years,
That kindle there the hallowed April flame
Of
comfort-breathing violets. By that shrine
Of Youth, Love, Death,
forevermore the same,
Violets still!--When falls, to leave no sign,
The arch of Constantine.
Most for his sake we dreamed. Tho' not as he,
From that lone spirit,
brimmed with human woe,
Your song once shook to surging
overflow.
How was it, sovran dweller of the tree,
His cry, still
throbbing in the flooded shell
Of silence with remembered melody,

Could draw from you no answer to the spell?
--O Voice, O Philomel?
Long time we wondered (and we knew not why):--
Nor dream, nor
prayer, of wayside gladness born,
Nor vineyards waiting, nor
reproachful thorn,
Nor yet the nested hill-towns set so high
All the
white way beside the girdling blue,--
Nor olives, gray against a
golden sky,
Could serve to wake that rapturous voice of you!
But the wise silence knew.

O Nightingale unheard!--Unheard alone,
Throughout that woven
music of the days
From the faint sea-rim to the market-place,
And
ring of hammers on cathedral stone!--
So be it, better