s: There's lots of ammunition for the little Maxim gun.


s: But after all the job is sure, although the job is slow,


s: We have to see the business through, the Boer has got to go.


s: With Nordenfeldt and lyddite shell it's certain, soon or late,


s: We'll hunt him from his kopjes and across the Orange State;


s: And then across those open flats you'll see the beggar run,


s: And we'll be running after with OUR little Maxim gun.


s: And we tramped along in the blazin' heat,


s: With never the sight of a bloomin' Boer,


s: Boers outranged 'em, but what cared they?


s: And you'd see them great gun-horses spring


s: To the 'action front' -- and around they'd swing.


s: Not though his mates dropped all around!


s: For they showed us how a corps SHOULD be run,


s: Guarding the waggons.'  'What, us?  No fear!


s: Where have we been?  Why, bless my heart,


s: Where have we been since the bloomin' start?


s: Most of the troops to the camp had gone,


s: And we said to the boys, as they walked her past,


s: 'Well, thank goodness, you're here at last!'


s: All of them were, as a matter of course,


s: For they'll smash him up with a rear attack,


s: This glorious truth we'd yet to learn it --


s: The four-point-seven supplied the bass --


s: You'd think the devil's band was playing.


s: And crept towards him, 'Hey! what cheer?


s: Buck up,' said he, 'I've come to save yer.


s: 'I'll stand you lots of beer and whisky.'


s: It's fifty pounds to one they'll hit me.'


s: I ain't a timid man at all, I'm just as brave as most,


s: I'll take my chance in open fight and die beside my post;


s: But riding round the 'ole day long as target for a Krupp,


s: A-drawing fire from Koppies -- well, I'm fair fed up.


s: It's wonderful how few get hit, it's luck that pulls us through;


s: Their rifle fire's no class at all, it misses me and you;


s: But when they sprinkle shells around like water from a cup


s: From that there blooming pom-pom gun -- well, I'm fed up.


s: We never get a chance to charge, to do a thrust and cut,


s: I'll have to chuck the Cavalry and join the Mounted Fut.


s: But after all -- What's Mounted Fut?  I saw them t'other day,


s: They occupied a Koppie when the Boers had run away.


s: The Cavalry went riding on and seen a score of fights,


s: Well! after that on Mounted Fut I'm fair fed up.


s: And tramping with the Footies ain't as easy as it looks,


s: They scarcely ever see a Boer except in picture books.


s: They do a march of twenty mile that leaves 'em nearly dead,


s: And then they find the bloomin' Boers is twenty miles ahead.


s: Each Footy is as full of fight as any bulldog pup,


s: But walking forty miles to fight -- well, I'm fed up!


s: So after all I think that when I leave the Cavalry


s: I'll either join the ambulance or else the A.S.C.;


s: They've always tucker in the plate and coffee in the cup,


s: But Bully Beef and Biscuits -- well! I'm fair fed up!


s: There's a soldier that's been doing of his share


s: In the fighting up and down and round about.


s: He's continually marching here and there


s: And he's fighting, morning in and morning out.


s: But sometimes when he hides behind a rock,


s: And we can't make no impression with the guns,


s: Oh, then you'll hear the order, 'Send for Jock!'


s: He's the fellow that can give or take a knock.


s: And his face is like the face what's on a clock.


s: But when the bullets fly you will mostly hear the cry --


s: The Cavalry have gun and sword and lance,


s: Before they choose their weapon, why, they're dead.


s: By holding of their helmets on their head.


s: And when the Boer has dug himself a trench


s: These mounted heroes -- pets of Johnny French --


s: They have to sit and wait and send for Jock!


s: 'Forty-Second!  At the double!  Charge the rocks!'


s: Halt!  Who goes there?  The sentry's call


s: *  "These lines have the true lyrical cry in them.


s: *  "Swinging, rattling ballads of ready humour, ready pathos,


s: and crowding adventure.  . . .  Stirring and entertaining ballads


s: *  "At his best he compares not unfavourably with the author


s: *  Mr. A. Patchett Martin (London):  "In my opinion,


s: *  "Australia has produced in Mr. A. B. Paterson a national poet


s: *  "A book like this . . . is worth a dozen of the aspiring,


s: idealistic sort, since it has a deal of rough laughter


s: and a dash of real tears in its composition."


s: in Mr. Paterson's book besides mere racing and chasing,


s: *  "He gallops along with a by no means doubtful music,


s: *  "There is no mistaking the vigour of Mr. Paterson's verse;


s: there is no difficulty in feeling the strong human interest


s: *  "Now and again a deeper theme, like an echo from the older,


s: *  "Mr. Paterson has powerful and varied sympathies,


s: coupled with a genuine lyrical impulse, and some skill,


s: *  "These are all entertaining, their rough and ready wit


s: and virility of expression making them highly acceptable,


s: while the dash of satire gives point to the humour."


s: *  "Will be welcome to that too select class at home who follow


s: *  "Fine, swinging, stirring stuff, that sings as it goes along.


s: The subjects are capital, and some of the refrains haunt one.


s: There is always room for a book of unpretentious, vigorous verse


s: _I sing no idle songs of dalliance days,


s: No pipes of Pan have set my heart to chiming.


s: If love songs witch you, close this book of mine,


s: A lusty love of life and all things human;


s: Still in me leaps the wonder of the boy,


s: A pride in man, a deathless faith in woman.


s: Still red blood calls, still rings the valiant fray;


s: Adventure beacons through the summer gloaming:


s: Oh long and long and long will be the day


s: _This earth is ours to love:  lute, brush and pen,


s: They are but tongues to tell of life sincerely;


s: O God of Scribes, grant us to grave them clearly!


s: Grant heart that homes in heart, then all is well.


s: Honey is honey-sweet, howe'er the hiving.


s: Each to his work, his wage at evening bell


s: I have known, I will swear, in a new life-span,


s: To care for the things that shall endure,


s: To shun all lures that debauch the soul,


s: To call him friend to the long trail-end,


s: To scorn all strife, and to view all life


s: From the red-rimmed star to the speck of sand,


s: For I know that the whole for good is planned,


s: In a flannel shirt from earth's clean dirt,


s: Then here's a hail to each flaring dawn!


s: And here's a cheer to the night that's gone!


s: "Deny your God!" they ringed me with their spears;


s: Blood-crazed were they, and reeking from the strife;


s: Hell-hot their hate, and venom-fanged their sneers,


s: And one man spat on me and nursed a knife.


s: And there was I, sore wounded and alone,


s: I, the last living of my slaughtered band.


s: In one red laugh of horror reeled the land.


s: And dazed and desperate I faced their spears,


s: And like a flame out-leaped that naked knife,


s: And like a serpent stung their bitter jeers:


s: "Deny your God, and we will give you life."


s: And it is hard in youth and hope to die;


s: And there my comrades dear lay at my feet,


s: And in that blear of blood soon must I lie.


s: And yet . . . I almost laughed -- it seemed so odd,


s: For long and long had I not vainly tried


s: And prayed for light, and doubted -- and _DENIED_:


s: Denied a life-to-be beyond the grave. . . .


s: And now they ask me, who do not believe,


s: Just to deny, to voice my doubt, to save


s: This life of mine that sings so in the sun,


s: The bloom of youth yet red upon my cheek,


s: My only life! -- O fools! 'tis easy done,


s: I will deny . . . and yet I do not speak.


s: "Deny your God!" their spears are all agleam,


s: And I can see their eyes with blood-lust shine;


s: Their snarling voices shrill into a scream,


s: And, mad to slay, they quiver for the sign.


s: How they would spit on me, these dogs of hell!


s: Spurn me, and put on me the brand of shame.


s: A white man's honour! what of that, I say?


s: Shall these black curs cry "Coward" in my face?


s: They who would perish for their gods of clay --


s: My country! what's my country to me now?


s: Soldier of Fortune, free and far I roam;


s: All men are brothers in my heart, I vow;


s: The wide and wondrous world is all my home.


s: My country! reverent of her splendid Dead,


s: Her heroes proud, her martyrs pierced with pain:


s: For me her puissant blood was vainly shed;


s: For me her drums of battle beat in vain,


s: And free I fare, half-heedless of her fate:


s: No faith, no flag I owe -- then why not seek


s: This last loop-hole of life?  Why hesitate?


s: I will deny . . . and yet I do not speak.


s: "Deny your God!" their spears are poised on high,


s: And tense and terrible they wait the word;


s: And dark and darker glooms the dreary sky,


s: And in that hush of horror no thing stirred.


s: Then, through the ringing terror and sheer hate


s: Leaped there a vision to me -- Oh, how far!


s: A face, Her face . . . through all my stormy fate


s: Beneath the pines, where lonely camp-fires gleam,


s: In seas forlorn, amid the deserts drear,


s: How I had gladdened to that face of dream!


s: O silken hair that veils the sunny brow!


s: Ah, yes, I must . . . for if I do this thing,


s: Knowing you think me more than half a king,


s: I with my craven heart, my honour slain.


s: No! no! my mind's made up.  I gaze above,


s: Not for my creed, my country, but my Love


s: Will I stand up and meet my death alone.


s: The God that dwells in me is not denied;


s: "Best" triumphs over "Beast", -- and so I think


s: "And now, my butchers, I embrace my fate.


s: Come! let my heart's blood slake the thirsty sod.


s: Curst be the life you offer!  Glut your hate!


s: Strike!  Strike, you dogs!  I'll _NOT_ deny my God."


s: I saw the spears that seemed a-leap to slay,


s: All quiver earthward at the headman's nod;


s: "Go, set him free who serves so well his God!"


s: Then Ed turned the crank, an' there on the bank


s: "_BAD MEDICINE!_" cried Old Tom, the One-eyed,


s: But no one gave heed to his little stampede,


s: that this here's a case of '_CANNED MAN'_."


s: There was Crusoe an' Scotty, an' Ma'am Shoeman Hank,


s: 'Twas silver an' gold, an' sweetness untold


s: So solemn they sat, an' they smoked an' they spat,


s: but their eyes sort o' glistened an' shone;


s: jest laughed till their stummicks was sore;


s: Six times Eddie set back that record an' yet


s: The teepees that stood by the edge of the wood;


s: 'Twas tender to tears, an' it brung back the years,


s: 'Twas home-love an' joy, 'twas the thought of my boy . . .


s: An' sez he:  "Cuss me, pard! but that there hits me hard;


s: She's turned eighty-three, an' she's only got me,


s: On Fond-du-lac's shore I'm hearin' once more


s: The summer's all gone, an' I'm still livin' on


s: Oh, I cut out the booze, an' with muscles an' thews


s: But it wasn't to be:  he'd a mother, you see,


s: Have ever you heard of the Land of Beyond,


s: Alluring it lies at the skirts of the skies,


s: Alluring it calls:  O ye the yoke galls,


s: With saddle and pack, by paddle and track,


s: Have ever you stood where the silences brood,


s: At the dawn of the day to behold far away


s: Yet ah! in the night when you gain to the height,


s: With the vast pool of heaven star-spawned,


s: Afar and agleam, like a valley of dream,


s: Thank God! there is always a Land of Beyond


s: A pride in our soul that mocks at a goal,


s: And try how we will, unattainable still,


s: Flat as a drum-head stretch the haggard snows;


s: The mighty skies are palisades of light;


s: The stars are blurred; the silence grows and grows;


s: Here in my sleeping-bag I cower and pray:


s: "Silence and night, have pity! stoop and slay."


s: I close my eyes with weariness -- that's all.


s: I still have strength to feed the drift-wood blaze,


s: I still have strength to pray:  "God rest her soul,


s: There in the cabin's alcove low she lies,


s: Still candles gleaming at her head and feet;


s: All snow-drop white, ash-cold, with closed eyes,


s: Lips smiling, hands at rest -- O God, how sweet!


s: How all unutterably sweet she seems. . . .


s: Not dead, not dead indeed -- she dreams, she dreams.


s: "Sunshine", I called her, and she brought, I vow,


s: God's blessed sunshine to this life of mine.


s: Life's furrow in a far-flung, lonely line;


s: In a wild land of dearth, barbaric, vast.


s: When did I see her first?  Long had I lain


s: Groping my way to life through fevered gloom.


s: Sudden the cloud of darkness left my brain;


s: A velvet bar of sunshine pierced the room,


s: She stood, she stood, all golden in its gold.


s: Sunshine!  O miracle! the earth grew glad;


s: Radiant each blade of grass, each living thing.


s: What a huge strength, high hope, proud will I had!


s: All the wide world with rapture seemed to ring.


s: Would she but wed me?  _YES_:  then fared we forth


s: Build gay camp-fires on greening strand!


s: And so we dreamed and drifted, she and I;


s: And how she loved that free, unfathomed life!


s: There in the peach-bloom of the midnight sky,


s: The silence welded us, true man and wife.


s: Then North and North invincibly we pressed


s: Beyond the Circle, to the world's white crest.


s: And on the wind-flailed Arctic waste we stayed,


s: Dwelt with the Huskies by the Polar sea.


s: Fur had they, white fox, marten, mink to trade,


s: And we had food-stuff, bacon, flour and tea.


s: So we made snug, chummed up with all the band:


s: Sudden the Winter swooped on Husky Land.


s: What was that ill so sinister and dread,


s: Smiting the tribe with sickness to the bone?


s: So that we waked one morn to find them fled;


s: So that we stood and stared, alone, alone.


s: Bravely she smiled and looked into my eyes;


s: Laughed at their troubled, stern, foreboding pain;


s: Gaily she mocked the menace of the skies,


s: Saying:  "'Twill soon be over, dearest one,


s: The long, long night:  then O the sun, the sun!"


s: She was all sunshine in those dubious days;


s: We chattered by the friendly drift-wood blaze;


s: Closer and closer cowered the hag-like night.


s: A wolf-howl would have been a welcome sound,


s: And there was none in all that stricken land;


s: Yet with such silence, darkness, death around,


s: Learned we to love as few can understand.


s: Spirit with spirit fused, and soul with soul,


s: What was that haunting horror of the night?


s: Brave was she; buoyant, full of sunny cheer.


s: Why was her face so small, so strangely white?


s: Then did I turn from her, heart-sick with fear;


s: Prayed in my pain to that insensate sky;


s: Grovelled and sobbed and cursed, and then arose:


s: "Sunshine!  O heart of gold! to die! to die!"


s: She died on Christmas day -- it seems so sad


s: That one you love should die on Christmas day.


s: No tears to shed, no moan, no prayer to pray.


s: I heard her whisper:  "Call me, will you, dear?


s: They say Death parts, but I won't go away.


s: Oh I will plead with God to let me stay!


s: Stay till the Night is gone, till Spring is nigh,


s: For weeks, for months I have not seen the sun;


s: How like a dream Life is! how vain! how stale!


s: I, too, am faint; that vampire-like disease


s: To bear the frost, the frost that fights decay,


s: The frost that keeps her beautiful alway.


s: Love of my life, come back, come back!"_


s: Lo! it did seem _HER EYES WERE OPEN WIDE_.


s: Surely I must have dreamed!  I stared once more. . . .


s: No, 'twas a candle's trick, a shadow cast.


s: There were her lashes locking as before.


s: (Oh, but it filled me with a joy so vast!)


s: No, 'twas a freak, a fancy of the brain,


s: (Oh, but to-night I'll try again, again!)


s: It was no dream; now do I know that Love


s: Leapt from the starry battlements of Death;


s: Calling her name with eager, burning breath,


s: Sudden there came a change:  again I saw


s: The radiance of the rose-leaf stain her cheek;


s: Rivers of rapture thrilled in sunny thaw;


s: Cleft were her coral lips as if to speak;


s: Curved were her tender arms as if to cling;


s: Open the flower-like eyes of lucent blue,


s: That I could fancy Heaven shining through.


s: "Sunshine," I faltered, "stay with me, oh, stay!"


s: Yet ere I finished, in a moment's flight,


s: Ah! but I know she'll come again to-night.


s: The Sun! at last the Sun!  I write these lines,


s: Here on my knees, with feeble, fumbling hand.


s: Look! in yon mountain cleft a radiance shines,


s: Gleam of a primrose -- see it thrill, expand,


s: Grow glorious.  Dear God be praised! it streams


s: Look! there she stands, the angel of my dreams,


s: First as I loved her when the darkness passed.


s: Now do I know God cares, at last, at last!


s: Light outlives dark, joy grief, and Love's the sum:


s: Heart of my heart!  Sunshine!  I come . . . I come. . . .


s: Have you heard of the louse who longed to dwell


s: He sighed all day and he sighed all night,


s: From the home of his youth so bright and gay,


s: And he made his way in a manner straight


s: (For a louse may go where a man must wait)


s: "There's something the matter, I'm afraid.


s: To-night ere for sleep my hair ye braid,


s: And lo, when they combed that shining hair


s: They found him alone in his glory there,


s: And he cried:  "I die, but I do not care,


s: And oh, how they sigh! and their throats are dry,


s: And there rang a yell, and it befell that Jim was overboard.


s: With mighty urge amid the surge of river-rage he leapt,


s: And gripped his mate and desperate he fought to gain the shore;


s: And there we stood like carven wood, our faces sickly white,


s: And watched him as he beat the foam, and inch by inch he lost;


s: And nearer, nearer drew the fall, and fiercer grew the fight,


s: Till on the very cascade crest a last farewell he tossed.


s: Then down and down and down they plunged into that pit of dread;


s: And mad we tore along the shore to claim our bitter dead.


s: And oh, they lay like senseless clay! and bitter hard we toiled,


s: Yet never, never gleam of hope, and we were weary men.


s: And moments mounted into hours, and black was our despair;


s: And faint were we, and we were fain to give them up as dead,


s: And then there came into his eyes a look of perfect peace.


s: And as there, at his very feet, the thwarted river raved,


s: It's a mighty good world, so it is, dear lass,


s: There's a smile and a tear, a sigh and a cheer,


s: Yet still I declare, foul weather or fair,


s: For look, lass! at night when I break from the fight,


s: There's comfort and rest, and the warmth of your breast,


s: There's fire-light and song -- Oh, the world may be wrong!


s: My home is my care -- if gladness be there,


s: O heart of pure gold!  I have made you a fold,


s: O little ones, rest!  I have fashioned a nest;


s: For there's no foe like fear, and there's no friend like cheer,


s: So crown Love as King, and let us all sing --


s: They turned him loose; he bowed his head,


s: He stared and stared from out the gloom;


s: And he saw the world through the span of space


s: And because he was bored, as some gods are,


s: He clutched the reins of a shooting star,


s: Till, tired at last, in a brook close by,


s: Who have wallowed awhile with the swine?


s: _On the ragged edge of the world I'll roam,


s: And the home of the wolf shall be my home,


s: And a bunch of bones on the boundless snows


s: The end of my trail . . . who knows, who knows!_


s: I'm dreaming to-night in the fire-glow, alone in my study tower,


s: My books battalioned around me, my Kipling flat on my knee;


s: But I'm not in the mood for reading, I haven't moved for an hour;


s: Weary of crushing a longing it's little I understand,


s: Here in my den it's quiet; the sea-wind taps on the pane;


s: Pictures and books and music, pleasure my last retreat.


s: Peace!  I thought I had gained it, I swore that my tale was told;


s: Out of the dark I hear it -- the Northland calling to me.


s: Eager and tense I'm straining -- isn't it most absurd?


s: Now in the churn and the lather, foam that hisses and stings,


s: Leap I, keyed for the struggle, fury and fume and roar;


s: Rocks are spitting like hell-cats -- Oh, it's a sport for kings,


s: How I thrill and I vision!  Then my camp of a night;


s: Red and gold of the fire-glow, net afloat in the stream;


s: Scent of the pines and silence, little "pal" pipe alight,


s: Body a-purr with pleasure, sleep untroubled of dream:


s: Banquet of paystreak bacon! moment of joy divine,


s: Ha! there's my servant calling, says that dinner will spoil.


s: What do I want with dinner?  Can I eat any more?


s: Can I sleep as I used to? . . .  Oh, I abhor this life!


s: Give me the Great Uncertain, the Barren Land for a floor,


s: The Milky Way for a roof-beam, splendour and space and strife:


s: Something to fight and die for -- the limpid Lake of the Bear,


s: The Empire of Empty Bellies, the dunes where the Dogribs dwell;


s: Am I too old, I wonder?  Can I take one trip more?


s: Go to the granite-ribbed valleys, flooded with sunset wine,


s: Peaks that pierce the aurora, rivers I must explore,


s: Lakes of a thousand islands, millioning hordes of the Pine?


s: Do they not miss me, I wonder, valley and peak and plain?


s: Whispering each to the other:  "Many a moon has passed . . .


s: Where has he gone, our lover?  Will he come back again?


s: Star with his fires our tundra, leave us his bones at last?"


s: Yes, I'll go back to the Northland, back to the way of the bear,


s: Back to the muskeg and mountain, back to the ice-leaguered sea.


s: Old am I! what does it matter?  Nothing I would not dare;


s: Give me a trail to conquer -- Oh, it is "meat" to me!


s: I will go back to the Northland, feeble and blind and lame;


s: Sup with the sunny-eyed Husky, eat moose-nose with the Cree;


s: Take me up over the Circle, under the flamboyant sun;


s: Turn me foot-loose like a savage -- that is the finish of me.


s: I know the trail I am seeking, it's up by the Lake of the Bear;


s: It's down by the Arctic Barrens, it's over to Hudson's Bay;


s: Maybe I'll get there, -- maybe:  death is set by a hair. . . .


s: Hark! it's the Northland calling! now must I go away. . . .


s: Go to my fate . . . who knows, who knows!_


s: They showed him strange, unwonted sights;


s: And when they sought his heart's desire:


s: They pulled his teeth so white and sound;


s: Me heap big chief, _ME LOOK LIKE HELL_."


s: With right good will let's climb the hill,


s: She lay like a saint on her copper couch;


s: In the stare of the ghoulish folks that slouch


s: Then came old Jules of the sightless gaze,


s: Each day he had come for a year of days,


s: "What's the Devil's Harvest to-day?" he cried;


s: He raised the head of the heedless Dead;


s: Then a deathly spell on the watchers fell --


s: He raised the head of the careless Dead;


s: And then with his sightless smile he said:


s: And you fled afar for the thing called Peace,


s: And feel the pulse of the Silences, and stand elate once more


s: On the verge of the yawning vastitudes that call to you in vain.


s: For I think you are one with the stars and the sun,


s: You have spent your life, you have waged your strife


s: I don't know which loss hurt the worse --


s: Just my dog and pipe and I, underneath the vast sky;


s: Trail to try and goal to win, white road and cool inn;


s: Fields to lure a lad afar, clear spring and still star;


s: None to hurry, none to hold, heather hill and hushed fold;


s: Nature like a picture book, laughing leaf and bright brook;


s: Every night a holy shrine, radiant for a day divine.


s: Weathered cheek and kindly eye, let the wanderer go by.


s: Woman-love and wistful heart, let the gipsy one depart.


s: For the farness and the road are his glory and his goad.


s: Oh, the lilt of youth and Spring!  Eyes laugh and lips sing.


s: On the clover swings the bee, overhead's the hale tree;


s: Sky of turquoise gleams through, yonder glints the lake's blue.


s: In a hammock let's swing, weary of wandering;


s: Tired of wild, uncertain lands, strange faces, faint hands.


s: Has the wondrous world gone cold?  Am I growing old, old?


s: Grey and weary . . . let me dream, glide on the tranquil stream.


s: Oh, what joyous days I've had, full, fervid, gay, glad!


s: Yet there comes a subtile change, let the stripling rove, range.


s: From sweet roving comes sweet rest, after all, home's best.


s: And if there's a little bit of woman-love with it,


s: I will count my life content, God-blest and well spent. . . .


s: At dawn of day the white land lay all gruesome-like and grim,


s: When Bill Mc'Gee he says to me:  "We've _GOT_ to do it, Jim.


s: We've got to make Fort Liard quick.  I know the river's bad,


s: Their little family group of two would soon be one of three.


s: And so I answered, careless-like:  "Why, Bill! you don't suppose


s: A real live man was Barb-wire Bill, with insides copper-lined;


s: They knew him well, the tribes who dwell within the Barren Land.


s: From Koyokuk to Kuskoquim his fame was everywhere;


s: And he did love, all life above, that little Julie Claire,


s: We crawled down to the river bank and feeble folk were we,


s: Black anchor-ice of strange device shot upward from its bed,


s: As night and day we cleft our way, and arrow-like we sped.


s: And sometimes he would seem to pray and sometimes seem to curse,


s: And bent above, with eyes of love, yet ever she grew worse.


s: And in the night he gripped me tight as I lay fast asleep:


s: And swift and strong we swept along to meet our awful doom.


s: And as with dread I glimpsed ahead the death that waited there,


s: My only thought was of the girl, the little Julie Claire;


s: And so, like demon mad with fear, I panted at the oar,


s: And foot by foot, and inch by inch, we worked the raft ashore.


s: Yet while I groped to find the rope, I heard Bill's savage cry:


s: I saw him crawl, I saw him fall, then run with rope in hand.


s: A little strand of hempen rope, and how I watched it there,


s: With all around a hell of sound, and darkness and despair;


s: A little strand of hempen rope, I watched it all alone,


s: And somewhere in the dark behind I heard a woman moan;


s: And somewhere in the dark ahead I heard a man cry out,


s: Then silence, silence, silence fell, and mocked my hollow shout.


s: And yet once more from out the shore I heard that cry of pain,


s: A moan of mortal agony, then all was still again.


s: I saw a flat and frozen shore of hideous device,


s: I saw a long-drawn strand of rope that vanished through the ice.


s: And on that treeless, rockless shore I found my partner -- dead.


s: Thus was Love conqueror of death, and life for life was given;


s: And though no saint on earth, d'ye think --


s: If you had the choice of two women to wed,


s: (Though of course the idea is quite absurd)


s: And the first from her heels to her dainty head


s: Was charming in every sense of the word:


s: And yet in the past (I grieve to state),


s: And the second -- she was beyond all cavil,


s: And yet, alas! she was dull as the devil,


s: Though what she was lacking in wit and beauty,


s: She more than made up for in "sense of duty".


s: Now, suppose you must wed, and make no blunder,


s: And either would love you, and let you win her --


s: Which of the two would you choose, I wonder,


s: The stolid saint or the sparkling sinner?


s: Just think! some night the stars will gleam


s: You could most see day-light through him.


s: Then one night the singin' stopped . . .


s: I know a mountain thrilling to the stars,


s: Peerless and pure, and pinnacled with snow;


s: Glimpsing the golden dawn o'er coral bars,


s: Flaunting the vanisht sunset's garnet glow;


s: Soaring in silvered steeps where cloud-surfs break;


s: And at her feet there dreams a quiet lake.


s: My lake adores my mountain -- well I know,


s: For I have watched it from its dawn-dream start,


s: Stilling its mirror to her splendid snow,


s: Framing her image in its trembling heart;


s: Glassing her graciousness of greening wood,


s: Gloomed with her sadness, gay when she is glad.


s: My lake has dreamed and loved since time was born;


s: Will love and dream till time shall cease to be;


s: Who looks towards the stars and will not see --


s: My peerless mountain, splendid in her scorn. . . .


s: The pet of vaudeville, so the posters say,


s: To see him pad his paunch with dainty cheer,


s: Puff his perfecto, swill champagne, and sway


s: Then bow himself off stage with brutish leer.


s: And as to-night, with noble knowledge crammed,


s: I 'mid this human compost take my place,


s: The woeful tears half freezing on my face:


s: "O God!" I cry, "let me but take his shape,


s: _"Mother, there's nothing more to eat --


s: Red are your cheeks, your eyes are bright;


s: Mother, there's always lots to eat. . . ."_


s: The clock to strike the hour of eight. . . .


s: Boy, or I'll kill you here to-night. . . ."_


s: Dance, little flame, with freakish glee!


s: Blanch the clock face that times my death!


s: Where in their sleeping-bags they sleep!


s: Sleep all the fell, black winter through


s: (The walrus blubber flares and gleams --


s: "For I will watch till Spring come round;


s: Strike, little clock, the hour of eight! . . .


s: Can you, dear comrade, blame me quite?" . . ._


s: His feet sloughed off, his fingers died,


s: Passed, and I'm here, alone, alone. . . .


s: Help . . . it is coming . . . near and near."


s: Death, gentle shadow of God's wing. . . .


s: Peopled with ghosts, that press and peer


s: Tortured and tense I wait, I wait. . . ."_


s: Raise up the gun -- it stings my brow --


s: When it strikes eight . . . all ready . . . _NOW_ --


s: Phantoms and fears and ghosts have gone.


s: Then the clock stopped . . . whose was the hand?


s: Maybe 'twas God's -- ah well, all's right.


s: Looking to God, and love . . . and love.


s: "Boys, it was hard -- but I'm not mad. . . .


s: Look at the clock -- it stopped, it stopped.


s: When you're lost in the Wild, and you're scared as a child,


s: And you're sore as a boil, it's according to Hoyle


s: But the Code of a Man says:  "Fight all you can,"


s: In hunger and woe, oh, it's easy to blow . . .


s: It's the hell-served-for-breakfast that's hard.


s: "You're sick of the game!"  Well, now, that's a shame.


s: You're young and you're brave and you're bright.


s: "You've had a raw deal!"  I know -- but don't squeal,


s: It's the plugging away that will win you the day,


s: Just draw on your grit; it's so easy to quit:


s: It's the keeping-your-chin-up that's hard.


s: It's easy to cry that you're beaten -- and die;


s: But to fight and to fight when hope's out of sight --


s: And though you come out of each gruelling bout,


s: Just have one more try -- it's dead easy to die,


s: The clover was in blossom, an' the year was at the June,


s: When Flap-jack Billy hit the town, likewise O'Flynn's saloon.


s: The frost was on the fodder an' the wind was growin' keen,


s: When Billy got to seein' snakes in Sullivan's shebeen.


s: Then in meandered Deep-hole Dan, once comrade of the cup:


s: "Oh Billy, for the love of Mike, why don't ye sober up?


s: I've got the gorgus recipay, 'tis smooth an' slick as silk --


s: Jest quit yer strangle-holt on hooch, an' irrigate with milk.


s: Lackteeal flooid is the lubrication you require;


s: Yer nervus frame-up's like a bunch of snarled piano wire.


s: You want to get it coated up with addypose tishoo,


s: So's it will work elastic-like, an' milk's the dope for you."


s: Well, Billy was complyable, an' in a month it's strange,


s: That cow-juice seemed to oppyrate a most amazin' change.


s: "Call up the water-wagon, Dan, an' book my seat," sez he.


s: An' though he objurgated some, they "cured" him night an' day;


s: An' pretty soon there came the change amazin' to explain:


s: "I'll never take another drink," sez Timothy O'Shane.


s: They tried it out on Spike Muldoon, that toper of renown;


s: They put it over Grouch McGraw, the terror of the town.


s: They roped in "tanks" from far and near, an' every test was sure,


s: An' it jest happened on that night with no predictive plan,


s: He left some milk from Riley's ranch a-settin' in a pan;


s: An' picture his amazement when he poured that milk next day --


s: There in the bottom of the pan a dozen "colours" lay.


s: We're blasted, bloomin' millionaires; dissemble an' lie low:


s: We'll follow them gold-bearin' cows, an' prospect where they go."


s: An' so it came to pass, fer weeks them miners might be found


s: A-sneakin' round on Riley's ranch, an' snipin' at the ground;


s: Till even Riley stops an' stares, an' presently allows:


s: "Them boys appear to take a mighty interest in cows."


s: An' night an' day they shadowed each auriferous bovine,


s: An' there was colours in the milk, but none was in the ground.


s: An' mighty desperate was they, an' down upon their luck,


s: When sudden, inspirationlike, the source of it they struck.


s: Light up your pipe again, old chum, and sit awhile with me;


s: I've got to watch the bannock bake -- how restful is the air!


s: You'd little think that we were somewhere north of Sixty-three,


s: Though where I don't exactly know, and don't precisely care.


s: The man-size mountains palisade us round on every side;


s: The river is a-flop with fish, and ripples silver-clear;


s: It doesn't matter, does it, pal?  We're of that breed of men


s: With whom the world of wine and cards and women disagree;


s: Your trouble was a roofless game of poker now and then,


s: And "raising up my elbow", that's what got away with me.


s: We're merely "Undesirables", artistic more or less;


s: My horny hands are Chopin-wise; you quote your Browning well;


s: And yet we're fooling round for gold in this damned wilderness:


s: The joke is, if we found it, we would both go straight to hell.


s: It's the tracking and the packing and the poling in the sun;


s: It's the sleeping in the open, it's the rugged, unfaked food;


s: It's the snow-shoe and the paddle, and the campfire and the gun,


s: And when I think of what I was, I know that it is good.


s: A mother duck with brood of ten comes squattering along;


s: The tawny, white-winged ptarmigan are flying all about;


s: And in that swirly, golden pool, a restless, gleaming throng,


s: The trout are waiting till we condescend to take them out.


s: I might be in my grave by now, forgotten and reviled,


s: Or rotting like a sickly cur in some far, foreign town.


s: I might be that vile thing I was, -- it all seems like a dream;


s: I owed a man a grudge one time that only life could pay;


s: And yet it's half-forgotten now -- how petty these things seem!


s: (But that's "another story", pal; I'll tell it you some day.)


s: How strange two "irresponsibles" should chum away up here!


s: But round the Arctic Circle friends are few and far between.


s: We've shared the same camp-fire and tent for nigh on seven year,


s: And never had a word that wasn't cheering and serene.


s: We've swept on danger side by side, and fought it back to back,


s: And you would die for me, old pal, and I would die for you.


s: Now there was that time I got lost in Rory Bory Land,


s: (How quick the blizzards sweep on one across that Polar sea!)


s: You formed a rescue crew of One, and saw a frozen hand


s: That stuck out of a drift of snow -- and, partner, it was Me.


s: But I got even, did I not, that day the paddle broke?


s: White water on the Coppermine -- a rock -- a split canoe --


s: Two fellows struggling in the foam (one couldn't swim a stroke):


s: In Rory Borealis Land the winter's long and black.


s: The silence seems a solid thing, shot through with wolfish woe;


s: And rowelled by the eager stars the skies vault vastly back,


s: And man seems but a little mite on that weird-lit plateau.


s: No thing to do but smoke and yarn of wild and misspent lives,


s: Beside the camp-fire there we sat -- what tales you told to me


s: Of love and hate, and chance and fate, and temporary wives!


s: In Rory Borealis Land, beside the Arctic Sea.


s: One yarn you told me in those days I can remember still;


s: It seemed as if I visioned it, so sharp you sketched it in;


s: Bellona was the name, I think; a coast town in Brazil,


s: Where nobody did anything but serenade and sin.


s: The stately pillars of the palms, the feathery bamboo,


s: The red-roofed houses and the swart, sun-dominated land,


s: The people ever children, and the heavens ever blue.


s: You told me of that girl of yours, that blossom of old Spain,


s: All glamour, grace and witchery, all passion, verve and glow.


s: How maddening she must have been!  You made me see her plain,


s: There by our little camp-fire, in the silence and the snow.


s: You loved her and she loved you.  She'd a husband, too, I think,


s: A doctor chap, you told me, whom she treated like a dog,


s: A white man living on the beach, a hopeless slave to drink --


s: That story seemed to strike me, pal -- it happens every day:


s: You had to go away awhile, then somehow it befell


s: The doctor chap discovered, gave her up, and disappeared;


s: Just reach me up my rifle quick; that's Mister Moose, I know --


s: The camp-fire's a confessional -- what funny yarns we spin!


s: It sort of made me think a bit, that story that you told.


s: The fig-leaf belt and Rory Bory are such odd extremes,


s: Yet after all how very small this old world seems to be . . .


s: Yes, that was quite a yarn, old pal, and yet to me it seems


s: You missed the point:  the point is that


s: Come out, O Little Moccasins, and frolic on the snow!


s: Come out, O tiny beaded feet, and twinkle in the light!


s: I'll play the old Red River reel, you used to love it so:


s: Awake, O Little Moccasins, and dance for me to-night!


s: Your hair was all a gleamy gold, your eyes a corn-flower blue;


s: Come out, O Little Moccasins!  I'll play so soft and low,


s: The songs you loved, the old heart-songs that in my mem'ry ring;


s: O child, I want to hear you now beside the campfire glow!


s: With all your heart a-throbbing in the simple words you sing.


s: For there was only you and I, and you were all to me;


s: And round us were the barren lands, but little did we fear;


s: Of all God's happy, happy folks the happiest were we. . . .


s: (Oh, call her, poor old fiddle mine, and maybe she will hear!)


s: And now that world can end to-night, and I will never care.


s: For there's a tiny wooden cross that pricks up through the snow:


s: (Poor Little Moccasins! you're tired, and so you lie at rest.)


s: And there's a grey-haired, weary man beside the campfire glow:


s: (O fiddle mine! the tears to-night are drumming on your breast.)


s: The Wanderlust has lured me to the seven lonely seas,


s: Has dumped me on the tailing-piles of dearth;


s: The Wanderlust has haled me from the morris chairs of ease,


s: Has hurled me to the ends of all the earth.


s: How bitterly I've cursed it, oh, the Painted Desert knows,


s: The wraithlike heights that hug the pallid plain,


s: The all-but-fluid silence, -- yet the longing grows and grows,


s: And I've got to glut the Wanderlust again.


s: _Soldier, sailor, in what a plight I've been!


s: Tinker, tailor, oh what a sight I've seen!


s: And I'm hitting the trail in the morning, boys,


s: The Wanderlust has got me . . . by the belly-aching fire,


s: By the fever and the freezing and the pain;


s: By the darkness that just drowns you, by the wail of home desire,


s: Life might have been a feast for me, now there are only crumbs;


s: Yet there's no rest or peace for me, imperious it drums,


s: _Highway, by-way, many a mile I've done;


s: Rare way, fair way, many a height I've won;


s: But I'm pulling my freight in the morning, boys,


s: The Wanderlust has taught me . . . it has whispered to my heart


s: Things all you stay-at-homes will never know.


s: The white man and the savage are but three short days apart,


s: Three days of cursing, crawling, doubt and woe.


s: Then it's down to chewing muclucs, to the water you can _EAT_,


s: To fish you bolt with nose held in your hand.


s: _Haunting, taunting, that is the spell of it;


s: Mocking, baulking, that is the hell of it;


s: But I'll shoulder my pack in the morning, boys,


s: The Wanderlust has blest me . . . in a ragged blanket curled,


s: I've watched the gulf of Heaven foam with stars;


s: I've walked with eyes wide open to the wonder of the world,


s: I've seen God's flood of glory burst its bars.


s: I've seen the gold a-blinding in the riffles of the sky,


s: But I'm freedom's happy bond-slave, and I will be till I die,


s: And I've got to thank the Wanderlust for that.


s: _Wild heart, child heart, all of the world your home.


s: Glad heart, mad heart, what can you do but roam?


s: Oh, I'll beat it once more in the morning, boys,


s: The Wanderlust will claim me at the finish for its own.


s: I'll turn my back on men and face the Pole.


s: Beyond the Arctic outposts I will venture all alone;


s: And I'm ready for the darkest trail of all.


s: _Grim land, dim land, oh, how the vastness calls!


s: Far land, star land, oh, how the stillness falls!


s: For you never can tell if it's heaven or hell,


s: Clean out of sight and out of mind . . .


s: The school-house and the Christmas tree;


s: Two bright blue eyes that smile on me . . .


s: With arms that cling and lips that cleave . . .


s: That crowd around their Christmas tree . . .


s: Stripped to the buff and gaunt and still


s: Like lost soul wailing, long and shrill,


s: The moon rides haggard and forlorn . . .


s: God bless all men -- it's Christmas morn.


s: There's much that's mighty strange, no doubt;


s: Truth, Beauty, Love uphold their sway --


s: When Chewed-ear Jenkins got hitched up to Guinneyveer McGee,


s: His flowin' locks, ye recollect, wuz frivolous an' free;


s: But in old Hymen's jack-pot, it's a most amazin' thing,


s: An' left old Chewed-ear balder than a white-washed cannon ball.


s: Now Missis Chewed-ear Jenkins, that wuz Guinneyveer McGee,


s: Wuz jest about as fine a draw as ever made a pair;


s: But when the boys got joshin' an' suggested it was she


s: That must be inflooenshul for the old man's slump in hair --


s: Why! Missis Chewed-ear Jenkins jest went clean up in the air.


s: "To demonstrate," sez she that night, "the lovin' wife I am,


s: I've bought a dozen bottles of Bink's Anty-Dandruff Balm.


s: Now, whether 'twas the prize or not 'tis mighty hard to say,


s: But Chewed-ear didn't seem to have much comfort from that day.


s: With bottles of that dandruff dope she followed at his heels,


s: An' sprinkled an' massaged him even when he ate his meals.


s: She waked him from his beauty sleep with tender, lovin' care,


s: An' rubbed an' scrubbed assiduous, yet never sign of hair.


s: Well, naturally all the boys soon tumbled to the joke,


s: An' at the Wow-wow's Social 'twas Cold-deck Davis spoke:


s: "The little woman's working mighty hard on Chewed-ear's crown;


s: Let's give her for a three-fifth's share a hundred dollars down.


s: The boys wuz on, an' soon chipped in the necessary dust;


s: They primed up a committy to negotiate the deal;


s: Then Missis Jenkins yielded, bein' rather in disgust,


s: An' all wuz signed an' witnessed, an' invested with a seal.


s: They yanked his hat off anxiouslike, opinin' one by one


s: Their magnifyin' glasses showed fine prospects everywhere.


s: They bought Hairlene, an' Thatchem, an' Jay's Capillery Juice,


s: An' everyone insisted on his speshul right to sluice


s: His speshul line of lotion onto Chewed-ear's cranium.


s: They only got the merrier the more the old man roared,


s: An' shares in "Jenkins Hirsute" went sky-highin' on the board.


s: The Syndicate wuz hopeful that they'd demonstrate the pay,


s: An' Missis Jenkins laboured in her perseverin' way.


s: Except the balance of the property, an' he wuz "mad".


s: "It gives me pain," he interjects, "to squash yer glowin' dream,


s: But you wuz fools when you got in on this here 'Hirsute' scheme.


s: You'll never raise a hair on me," when lo! that very night,


s: Preparin' to retire he got a most onpleasant fright:


s: For on that shinin' dome of his, so prominently bare,


s: He felt the baby outcrop of a second growth of hair.


s: A thousand dollars!  Sufferin' Caesar!  Well, it must be saved!


s: An' sneaks away, an' buys some Hair Destroyer on the sly.


s: So there wuz Missis Jenkins with "Restorer" wagin' fight,


s: An' Chewed-ear with "Destroyer" circumventin' her at night.


s: The battle wuz a mighty one; his nerves wuz on the strain,


s: An' yet in spite of all he did that hair began to gain.


s: The situation grew intense, so quietly one day,


s: He gave his share-holders the slip, an' made his get-a-way.


s: Jest like a criminal he skipped, an' aimed to defalcate


s: The Chewed-ear Jenkins Hirsute Propagation Syndicate.


s: His guilty secret burned him, an' he sought the city's din:


s: "I've got to get a wig," sez he, "to cover up my sin.


s: It's growin', growin' night an' day; it's most amazin' hair";


s: An' when he looked at it that night, he shuddered with despair.


s: He shuddered an' suppressed a cry at what his optics seen --


s: For on my word of honour, boys, that hair wuz growin' _GREEN_.


s: At first he guessed he'd get some dye, an' try to dye it black;


s: An' then he saw 'twas Nemmysis wuz layin' on his track.


s: He must jest face the music, an' confess the thing he done,


s: An' pay the boys an' Guinneyveer the money they had won.


s: An' then there came a big idee -- it thrilled him like a shock:


s: Why not control the Syndicate by buyin' up the Stock?


s: An' so next day he hurried back with smoothly shaven pate,


s: An' for a hundred dollars he bought up the Syndicate.


s: 'Twas mighty frenzied finance an' the boys set up a roar,


s: But "Hirsutes" from the market wuz withdrawn for evermore.


s: An' to this day in Nuggetsville they tell the tale how slick


s: The Syndicate sold out too soon, and Chewed-ear turned the trick.


s: You will sleep, and when from dreams you start,


s: You will hear their quivering good-byes.


s: Yours will be the heart-ache and the smart,


s: There will come a peace within your heart;


s: Time will dry the tear and dull the smart.


s: You will know that you have played your part;


s: Yours shall be the love that never dies:


s: You, with Heaven's peace within your heart,


s: The lone man gazed and gazed upon his gold,


s: His sweat, his blood, the wage of weary days;


s: But now how sweet, how doubly sweet to hold


s: All gay and gleamy to the campfire blaze.


s: The willows shivered, wanly lay the snow;


s: Peered through its ragged shroud.  The lone man sighed,


s: Poured back the gaudy dust into its poke,


s: Gazed at the seething river listless-eyed,


s: Loaded his corn-cob pipe as if to smoke;


s: Then crushed with weariness and hardship crept


s: Into his ragged robe, and swiftly slept.


s: Hour after hour went by; a shadow slipped


s: From vasts of shadow to the camp-fire flame;


s: A gaunt and hairy man with wolfish eyes . . .


s: The sleeper dreamed, and lo! this was his dream:


s: He rode a streaming horse across a moor.


s: Sudden 'mid pit-black night a lightning gleam


s: Showed him a way-side inn, forlorn and poor.


s: A sullen host unbarred the creaking door,


s: Wherein he sat and poked the fire a-roar,


s: So that weird shadows jigged athwart the gloom.


s: He ordered wine.  'Od's blood! but he was tired.


s: What matter!  Charles was crushed and George was King;


s: His party high in power; how he aspired!


s: Red guineas packed his purse, too tight to ring.


s: The fire-light gleamed upon his silken hose,


s: His silver buckles and his powdered wig.


s: What ho! more wine!  He drank, he slowly rose.


s: What made the shadows dance that madcap jig?


s: He clutched the candle, steered his way to bed,


s: And in a trice was sleeping like the dead.


s: Across the room there crept, so shadow soft,


s: His sullen host, with naked knife a-gleam,


s: (A gaunt and hairy man with wolfish eyes.) . . .


s: And as he lay, the sleeper dreamed a dream.


s: With chains that bit and festered to the bone.


s: They haled him harshly to a vaulted room,


s: Where One gazed on him with malignant eye;


s: And in that devil-face he read his doom,


s: Knowing that ere the dawn-light he must die.


s: Well, he was sorrow-glutted; let them bring


s: Their prize assassins to the bloody work.


s: His kingdom lost, yet would he die a King,


s: Fearless and proud, as when he faced the Turk.


s: Ah God! the glory of that great Crusade!


s: The bannered pomp, the gleam, the splendid urge!


s: The crash of reeking combat, blade to blade!


s: The reeling ranks, blood-avid and a-surge!


s: For long he thought; then feeling o'er him creep


s: The cell door opened; soft the headsman came,


s: (A gaunt and hairy man with wolfish eyes,) . . .


s: And as he lay, the sleeper dreamed a dream.


s: 'Twas in a land unkempt of life's red dawn;


s: Where in his sanded cave he dwelt alone;


s: Sleeping by day, or sometimes worked upon


s: His flint-head arrows and his knives of stone;


s: By night stole forth and slew the savage boar,


s: So that he loomed a hunter of loud fame,


s: And many a skin of wolf and wild-cat wore,


s: And counted many a flint-head to his name;


s: Wherefore he walked the envy of the band,


s: Hated and feared, but matchless in his skill.


s: Till lo! one night deep in that shaggy land,


s: He tracked a yearling bear and made his kill;


s: And sank into a sleep too deep for dream.


s: Through those dark woods, and marked him where he lay;


s: Cowered and crawled upon him as he slept,


s: (A gaunt and hairy man with wolfish eyes.) . . .


s: The great stone crashed.  The Dreamer shrieked and woke,


s: And saw, fear-blinded, in his dripping cell,


s: A gaunt and hairy man, who with one stroke


s: Swung a great ax of steel that flashed and fell . . .


s: And saw, hair-poised, a naked, thirsting knife,


s: A gaunt and hairy man with eyes of doom --


s: And then the blade plunged down to drink his life . . .


s: So that he woke, wrenched back his robe, and looked,


s: A gaunt and hairy man with finger crooked --


s: A rifle rang, a bullet searched his heart . . .


s: Grotesque the Dreamer sprawled, and did not rise.


s: For long and long there gazed upon some gold


s: Three score and ten, the psalmist saith,


s: I've mocked at those who prate and preach;


s: The cow-moose comes to water, and the beaver's overbold,


s: The teepee stars the vivid sward with russet, red and gold,


s: And in the velvet gloom the fire's a-gleam.


s: The night is ripe with quiet, rich with incense of the pine;


s: Cloud-high I climbed but yesterday; a hundred miles around


s: As in a crystal lens it lay, a land without a bound,


s: All lure, and virgin vastitude, and dream.


s: The heedless hordes of caribou were streaming to the West,


s: Yea, mine to frame my Odyssey:  Oh, little do they know


s: My conquest and the kingdom that I keep!


s: The meadows of the musk-ox, where the laughing grasses grow,


s: The rivers where the careless conies leap.


s: Beyond the silent Circle, where white men are fierce and few,


s: Like a flame upon the water is my little light canoe,


s: A squaw man! yes, that's what I am; sneer at me if you will.


s: I've gone the grilling pace that cannot last;


s: With bawdry, bridge and brandy -- Oh, I've drank enough to kill


s: I've swung round to my senses, found the place where I belong;


s: But here beyond the Circle, where there's neither right or wrong,


s: Yet ever in the far forlorn, by trails of lone desire;


s: Yet ever in the dawn's white leer of hate;


s: Yet ever by the dripping kill, beside the drowsy fire,


s: There comes the fierce heart-hunger for a mate.


s: There comes the mad blood-clamour for a woman's clinging hand,


s: Love-humid eyes, the velvet of a breast;


s: And so I sought the Bonnet-plumes, and chose from out the band


s: The girl I thought the sweetest and the best.


s: O wistful women I have loved before my dark disgrace!


s: Dear ladies, if I saw you now I'd turn away my face,


s: Then crawl to kiss your foot-prints in the sand!


s: And yet -- that day the rifle jammed -- a wounded moose at bay --


s: The man must have the woman, and we're all brutes more or less,


s: Since first the male ape shinned the family tree;


s: And yet I think I love her with a husband's tenderness,


s: And yet I know that she would die for me.


s: Oh, if I left you, Laughing Eyes, and nevermore came back,


s: God help you, girl!  I know what you would do. . . .


s: I see the lake wan in the moon, and from the shadow black,


s: There drifts a little, _EMPTY_ birch canoe.


s: But by the gods I hail you on this hushed and holy night


s: As the mother of my children, and my squaw.


s: I see your little slender face set in the firelight glow;


s: I hear you croon a baby song, all slumber-soft and low --


s: God bless you, little Laughing Eyes!  I'm glad.


s: I'm scared of it all, God's truth! so I am;


s: My nerve's on the raw and I don't give a damn


s: I'm pinned between subway and overhead train,


s: Oh, I want to go back to the timber again --


s: I want to go back to my lean, ashen plains;


s: My ultimate valleys where solitude reigns;


s: My forests packed full of mysterious gloom,


s: The city is deadfalled with danger and doom --


s: I watch the wan faces that flash in the street;


s: Just jaded and panting like dogs in a pack;


s: O God! but I'm lonesome -- I wish I was back,


s: I wish I was back on the Hunger Plateaus,


s: I wish I was up where the Coppermine flows


s: I'd like to be far on some weariful shore,


s: Oh, I wish I was snug in the Arctic once more,


s: I prowl in the canyons of dismal unrest;


s: I can't get my bearings, I'm crushed and oppressed


s: The slaves and the madman, the lust and the sweat,


s: The getting, the spending, the fever, the fret --


s: I feel it's all wrong, but I can't tell you why --


s: The insolent towers that sprawl to the sky,


s: I'm trapped like a fox and I fear for my pelt;


s: Oh, I want to be back in the avalanche belt,


s: I'm scared of it all:  Oh, afar I can hear


s: We're nothing but brute with a little veneer,


s: There's tumult and terror abroad in the street;


s: I've got to get back to my thousand-mile beat;


s: The trail where the cougar and silver-tip meet;


s: The snows and the camp-fire, with wolves at my feet;


s: Ho! we were strong, we were swift, we were brave.


s: Youth was a challenge, and Life was a fight.


s: Sprang from the rally, and leapt for the height.


s: Smiling is Love in a foam of Spring flowers:


s: Harden our hearts to him -- on let us press!


s: Oh, what a triumph and pride shall be ours!


s: See where it beacons, the star of success!


s: Cares seem to crowd on us -- so much to do;


s: New fields to conquer, and time's on the wing.


s: Grey hairs are showing, a wrinkle or two;


s: Somehow our footstep is losing its spring.


s: Pleasure's forsaken us, Love ceased to smile;


s: Youth has been funeralled; Age travels fast.


s: Sometimes we wonder:  is it worth while?


s: There! we have gained to the summit at last.


s: Aye, we have triumphed!  Now must we haste,


s: Revel in victory . . . why! what is wrong?


s: Life's choicest vintage is flat to the taste --


s: Are we too late?  Have we laboured too long?


s: Wealth, power, fame we hold . . . ah! but the truth:


s: Would we not give this vain glory of ours


s: For one mad, glad year of glorious youth,


s: Life in the Springtide, and Love in the flowers.


s: Heed me, feed me, I am hungry, I am red-tongued with desire;


s: Heap them on me, let me hug them to my eager heart of fire,


s: Roaring, soaring up to heaven as a symbol and a sign.


s: Bring me knots of sunny maple, silver birch and tamarack;


s: Leaping, sweeping, I will lap them with my ardent wings of flame;


s: Streaming, gleaming, I will goad them to my glory and my fame.


s: Bring me gnarly limbs of live-oak, aid me in my frenzied fight;


s: Strips of iron-wood, scaly blue-gum, writhing redly in my hold;


s: Let me star the dim sierras, stab with light the inland seas;


s: Roaming wind and roaring darkness! seek no mercy at my hands;


s: I will mock the marly heavens, lamp the purple prairies,


s: On the starlit coral beaches when the combers thunder down,


s: In the death-spell of the barrens, in the shudder of the snows;


s: In a blazing belt of triumph from the palm-leaf to the pine,


s: As a symbol of defiance lo! the wilderness I span;


s: And my beacons burn exultant as an everlasting sign


s: Of unending domination, of the mastery of Man;


s: I, the Spirit of the Struggle; I, the mighty God of Fire;


s: Gather round me, boy and grey-beard, frontiersman of every kind.


s: Few are you, and far and lonely, yet an army forms behind:


s: Peer into my heart of solace, break your bannock at my blaze;


s: For you seek the silent spaces, and their secret lore you glean:


s: For you win the savage races, and the brutish Wild you wean;


s: And I gladden desert places, where camp-fire has never been.


s: From the Pole unto the Tropics is there trail ye have not dared?


s: On the roaring Arkilinik in a leaky bark canoe;


s: Now a smudge of wiry willows on the weary Kuskoquim;


s: Now a flare of gummy pine-knots where Vancouver's scaur is grim;


s: Now a gleam of sunny ceiba, when the Cuban beaches dim.


s: Always, always God's Great Open:  lo! I burn with keener light


s: In the corridors of silence, in the vestibules of night;


s: Not for weaklings, not for women, like my brother of the hearth;


s: Ring your songs of wrath around me, I was made for manful mirth,


s: In the lusty, gusty greatness, on the bald spots of the earth.


s: Men, my masters! men, my lovers! ye have fought and ye have bled;


s: By my heart of solace dreaming, rest ye and be comforted!


s: I am dying, O my masters! by my fitful flame ye sleep;


s: My purple plumes of glory droop forlorn.


s: Grey ashes choke and cloak me, and above the pines there creep


s: There comes a countless army, it's the Legion of the Light;


s: It tramps in gleaming triumph round the world;


s: Back in to abysmal darknesses are hurled.


s: Leap to life again, my lovers! ye must toil and never tire;


s: The day of daring, doing, brightens clear,


s: When the bed of spicy cedar and the jovial camp-fire


s: There is hope and golden promise in the vast portentous dawn;


s: There is glamour in the glad, effluent sky:


s: A little heap of ashes, grey and sodden by the rain,


s: Wind-scattered, blurred and blotted by the snow:


s: Let that be all to tell of me, and glorious again,


s: Ye things of greening gladness, leap and glow!


s: A black scar in the sunshine by the palm-leaf or the pine,


s: Blind to the night and dead to all desire;


s: Yet oh, of life and uplift what a symbol and a sign!


s: Yet oh, of power and conquest what a destiny is mine!


s: A little heap of ashes -- Yea! a miracle divine,


s: The foot-print of a god, all-radiant Fire.


s: "I'm taking pen in hand this night, and hard it is for me;


s: My poor old fingers tremble so, my hand is stiff and slow,


s: And even with my glasses on I'm troubled sore to see. . . .


s: You'd little know your mother, boy; you'd little, little know.


s: I'm waiting at the road's end, lad; and all that's in my heart,


s: Is just to see my boy again before I'm called away."


s: "Oh well I mind the sorry day you crossed the gurly sea;


s: 'Twas like the heart was torn from me, a waeful wife was I.


s: You said that you'd be home again in two years, maybe three;


s: But nigh a score of years have gone, and still the years go by.


s: I know it's cruel hard for you, you've bairnies of your own;


s: I know the siller's hard to win, and folks have used you ill:


s: But oh, think of your mother, lad, that's waiting by her lone!


s: And even if you canna come -- _JUST WRITE AND SAY YOU WILL_."


s: I'm thinking there will be no 'next'; I'm thinking soon I'll lie


s: But if you'll only _SAY_ you'll come, then will I hope and pray.


s: I'm waiting by the grave-side, lad; and all that's in my heart


s: The Dreamer visioned Life as it might be,


s: And from his dream forthright a picture grew,


s: A painting all the people thronged to see,


s: And joyed therein -- till came the Man Who Knew,


s: Saying:  "'Tis bad!  Why do ye gape, ye fools!


s: He painteth not according to the schools."


s: The Dreamer probed Life's mystery of woe,


s: And in a book he sought to give the clue;


s: The people read, and saw that it was so,


s: And read again -- then came the Man Who Knew,


s: Saying:  "Ye witless ones! this book is vile:


s: It hath not got the rudiments of style."


s: Love smote the Dreamer's lips, and silver clear


s: He sang a song so sweet, so tender true,


s: That all the market-place was thrilled to hear,


s: And listened rapt -- till came the Man Who Knew,


s: Saying:  "His technique's wrong; he singeth ill.


s: Waste not your time."  The singer's voice was still.


s: And then the people roused as if from sleep,


s: Crying:  "What care we if it be not Art!


s: Hath he not charmed us, made us laugh and weep?


s: Come, let us crown him where he sits apart."


s: Then, with his picture spurned, his book unread,


s: His song unsung, they found their Dreamer -- _DEAD_.


s: In the moonless, misty night, with my little pipe alight,


s: I am sitting by the camp-fire's fading cheer;


s: Oh, the dew is falling chill on the dim, deer-haunted hill,


s: And the breakers in the bay are moaning drear.


s: The toilful hours are sped, the boys are long abed,


s: In the sightless, sullen sky I can hear the night-hawk cry,


s: And the frogs in frenzied chorus from the creek.


s: And somehow the embers' glow brings me back the long ago,


s: The days of merry laughter and light song;


s: When I sped the hours away with the gayest of the gay


s: In the giddy whirl of fashion's festal throng.


s: Oh, I ran a grilling race and I little recked the pace,


s: For the lust of youth ran riot in my blood;


s: But at last I made a stand in this God-forsaken land


s: Of the pine-tree and the mountain and the flood.


s: And now I've got to stay, with an overdraft to pay,


s: For pleasure in the past with future pain;


s: And I'm not the chap to whine, for if the chance were mine


s: I know I'd choose the old life once again.


s: With its woman's eyes a-shine, and its flood of golden wine;


s: The old life with its din, its laughter and its sin --


s: And chuck me in the gutter when it's done.


s: Ah, well! it's past and gone, and the memory is wan,


s: That conjures up each old familiar face;


s: And here by fortune hurled, I am dead to all the world,


s: And I've learned to lose my pride and keep my place.


s: My ways are hard and rough, and my arms are strong and tough,


s: And I hew the dizzy pine till darkness falls;


s: And sometimes I take a dive, just to keep my heart alive,


s: Among the gay saloons and dancing halls.


s: In the distant, dinful town just a little drink to drown


s: The cares that crowd and canker in my brain;


s: Just a little joy to still set my pulses all a-thrill,


s: And things will go on so until one day I shall know


s: That Death has got me cinched beyond a doubt;


s: Then I'll crawl away from sight, and morosely in the night


s: And the moaning pine will wave overhead a nameless grave,


s: Where the black snake in the sunshine loves to coil.


s: And they'll leave me there alone, and perhaps with softened tone


s: Speak of me sometimes in the camp-fire's glow,


s: As a played-out, broken chum, who has gone to Kingdom Come,


s: And who went the pace in England long ago.


s: The countless eyes that stare and stare;


s: There! bless you now!  Old Year, good-bye!


s: Twiddle your heart-strings in his clutch.


s: Sober am I nonentitized; drunk am I more than half a god.


s: Smith had a friend, we'll call him Brown;


s: Brown would rescue and pull him through.


s: Brown answered:  "Master, you have dipped


s: but some lanes end in the Potter's field;


s: tears a-freeze on his sharp cheek-bones,


s: Brown enrolled in the homeless host, sleeping anywhere, anywhen;


s: worth a thousand -- think, man! the shame. . . ."


s: Brown with his heart pain-pierced the while,


s: with his stern, starved face, and his lips stone-pale,


s: it seemed that the whole-world fabric shook,


s: he gazed and gazed at the garret wall. . . .


s: For a long, long time Brown did not speak;


s: and he kissed her hand in the dismal gloom.


s: his well-loved friend, his worshipped wife;


s: unfolded the sheets and spread them out. . . .


s: On his knees by her side he limply sank,


s: peering amazed -- _EACH PAGE WAS BLANK_.


s: for the awful records of Heav'n and Hell.)


s: O dear little cabin, I've loved you so long,


s: I've filled you with laughter, I've thrilled you with song,


s: Your walls they have witnessed a weariful fight,


s: But oh, in my triumph I'm dreary to-night --


s: Your roof is bewhiskered, your floor is a-slant,


s: I'm trying to find just your faults, but I can't --


s: You poor, tired, heart-broken old thing!


s: I've seen when you've been the best friend that I had,


s: You're sort of a part of me -- Gee! but I'm sad;


s: Below your cracked window red raspberries climb;


s: Your rafters are scribbled with adage and rhyme,


s: "Each day has its laugh", and "Don't worry, just work".


s: Old calendars dangle -- what memories lurk


s: I hear the world-call and the clang of the fight;


s: Yet well do I know, as I quit you to-night,


s: And often I'll think of you, empty and black,


s: Oh, if I should perish my ghost will come back


s: How cold, still and lonely, how weary you seem!


s: Oh, will you remember the lad with his dream!


s: The shadows enfold you, it's drawing to-night;


s: And huh! but it's stinging and stabbing my sight --


s: Pine that the north wind whinneys through --


s: When from my fumbling hand the tired pen falls,


s: And in the twilight weary droops my head;


s: While to my quiet heart a still voice calls,


s: Calls me to join my kindred of the Dead:


s: Grant that I may, O Lord, ere rest be mine,


s: Write to Thy praise one radiant, ringing line.


s: For all of worth that in this clay abides,


s: The leaping rapture and the ardent flame,


s: The hope, the high resolve, the faith that guides:


s: All, all is Thine, and liveth in Thy name:


s: Lord, have I dallied with the sacred fire!


s: Lord, have I trailed Thy glory in the mire!


s: E'en as a toper from the dram-shop reeling,


s: Sees in his garret's blackness, dazzling fair,


s: All that he might have been, and, heart-sick, kneeling,


s: When the accounting comes, how shall I pay?


s: For in the dark I grope, nor understand;


s: And in my heart fight selfishness and sin:


s: Yet, Lord, I do not seek Thy helping hand;


s: Let me through strife and penitential pain


s: Onward and upward to the heights attain.


s: Yea, let me live my life, its meaning seek;


s: Strive to be strong that I may aid the weak;


s: Dare to be true -- O God! the Light, the Light!


s: Cometh the Dark so soon.  I've mocked Thy Word;


s: Yet do I know Thy Love:  have mercy, Lord. . . .


s: The Spell of the Yukon (1907) a.k.a. Songs of a Sourdough


s: A tremulous murmur from great days long dead.


s: The flame, the noble pageant of our life;


s: The burning seal that stamps man's high indenture


s: To vain attempt and most forlorn adventure;


s: Romance and purple seas, and toppling towns,


s: And the wind's valiance crying o'er the downs.


s: Alexander VI Dines with the Cardinal of Capua


s: This poem received the nineteenth award of the prize offered by


s: "Oh yes, I went over to Edmonstoun the other day and saw


s: Johnny, mooning around as usual!  He will never make his


s: Night falls; the great jars glow against the dark,


s: Dark green, dusk red, and, like a coiling snake,


s: Great ropes of gorgeous vapor twist and turn


s: Saw the swart genie rise when the lead seal,


s: Scribbled with charms, was lifted from the jar;


s: And -- well, how went the tale?  Like this, like this?...


s: No herbage broke the barren flats of land,


s: No winds dared loiter within smiling trees,


s: Nor were there any brooks on either hand,


s: One boat toiled noiselessly along the deep,


s: Upon its track.  Far out the brown nets sweep,


s: Across the intolerable mirror of the sea.


s: Twice the nets rise, a-trail with sea-plants brown,


s: Distorted shells, and rocks green-mossed with slime,


s: Nought else.  The fisher, sick at heart, kneels down;


s: He thinks, then, kneeling, casts for the third time.


s: And lo! an earthen jar, bound round with brass,


s: About the bright waves gleam like shattered glass,


s: The sun dips, flat and red, about to set.


s: The prow grates on the beach.  The fisherman


s: Stoops, tearing at the cords that bind the seal.


s: Shall pearls roll out, lustrous and white and wan?


s: Unheard-of stones that make the sick mind reel


s: With wonder of their beauty?  Rubies, then?


s: Green emeralds, glittering like the eyes of beasts?


s: Hard, regal diamonds, like kingly feasts?


s: He tugged; the seal gave way.  A little smoke


s: Curled like a feather in the darkening sky.


s: A blinding gush of fire burst, flamed, and broke.


s: Armored with light, and turbaned terribly,


s: A genie tramped the round earth underfoot;


s: His head sought out the stars, his cupped right hand


s: Made half the sky one darkness.  He was mute.


s: Drooped lower.  Scarlet eddied o'er the sand.


s: Thy prize awaits thee; come, and hug it close!


s: A noble crown thy draggled nets have won


s: Blessed are fools!  A gift remains for those!"


s: His hand sought out his sword, and lightnings flared


s: Across the sky in one great bloom of fire.


s: Poised like a toppling mountain, it hung bared;


s: Along its hilt.  The air burnt like a pyre.


s: Once more the genie spoke:  "Something I owe


s: To thee, thou fool, thou fool.  Come, canst thou sing?


s: Yea?  Sing then; if thy song be brave, then go


s: Find first some task, some overmastering thing


s: For if thou dost not thou shalt surely die!"


s: The sword whirled back.  The fisherman uprose,


s: And if at first his voice was weak with fear


s: And his limbs trembled, it was but a doze,


s: He stood up straight.  His voice rang loud and clear.


s: Till one rose, crowned with laurel-leaves,


s: And all their talk was a clangor of war,


s: You have taken the sign of a terrible thing,


s: You have drunk down God with your beeswing,


s: And the world's end is your journey's end,


s: "Then, though they give you to be burned,


s: You have found the world's heart in the turn of a cheek,


s: Where the lost and furious fight goes by --


s: The last faint echoes rang along the plains,


s: Died, and were gone.  The genie spoke:  "Thy song


s: Serves well enough -- but yet thy task remains;


s: Shall torture him who dares delay too long!"


s: His brown face hardened to a leaden mask.


s: A bitter brine crusted the fisher's cheek --


s: The hard cup of the sky shone, gemmed and bleak.


s: "O love, whom I have sought by devious ways;


s: You whose bright hair has burned across my days,


s: "You have I served.  Now fire has parched the vine,


s: And Death is on the singers and the song.


s: No longer are there lips to cling to mine,


s: "O love, soft-moving, delicate and tender!


s: In her gold house the pipe calls querulously,


s: They cloud with thin green silks her body slender,


s: Come, piteous, gentle love, and set me free!"


s: He ceased -- and, slowly rising o'er the deep,


s: A faint song chimed, grew clearer, till at last


s: Making the sea one splendor where it passed.


s: A golden boat!  The bright oars rested soon,


s: And the prow met the sand.  The purple veils


s: Misting the cabin fell.  Fair as the moon


s: A gold-robed princess stepped upon the beach.


s: The fisher knelt and kissed her garment's hem,


s: And then her lips, and strove at last for speech.


s: "Here thy strength breaks, thy might is nought to stem!"


s: He cried at last.  Speech shook him like a flame:


s: "Yea, though thou plucked the stars from out the sky,


s: Each lovely one would be a withered shame --


s: The genie heard.  A slow smile came like dawn


s: Over his face.  "Thy task is done!" he said.


s: A whirlwind roared, smoke shattered, he was gone;


s: The moon shone clear, no longer smoked and red.


s: They passed into the boat.  The gold oars beat


s: Loudly, then fainter, fainter, till at last


s: Along the whispering sand -- till all the vast


s: Expanse of sea began to shake with heat,


s: And morning brought soft airs, by sailors loved.


s: Quinine -- I pour the little bitter grains


s: Out upon blue, glazed squares of paper.  So.


s: And all the dusk I shall sit here alone,


s: How the blurred labels run on the old jars!


s: The harsh taste of white poppies; India --


s: The writhing woods a-crawl with monstrous life,


s: Save where the deodars are set like spears,


s: Opium -- brown and warm and slender-breasted


s: She rises, shaking off the cool black water,


s: And twisting up her hair, that ripples down,


s: How the drops sparkle in the moonlight!  Once


s: I made a rhyme about it, singing softly:


s: Still the lamps blaze within those halls,


s: For girls to tread; the thick air palls;


s: Their white feet fall like flakes of snow,


s: She sees the white blooms crushed, and smells


s: "Then Haroun takes her!"  But she dreams,


s: Where the cords irked her -- till she came,


s: She woke, the moon shone, bright as rime,


s: Leaving the air yet heavy -- cassia -- myrrh --


s: Bitter and splendid.  See, the poisons come,


s: Trooping in squat green vials, blazoned red


s: With grinning skulls:  strychnine, a pallid dust


s: Of tiny grains, like bones ground fine; and next


s: Likest the face of one long dead -- they creep


s: Along the dusty shelf like deadly beetles,


s: Whose fangs are carved with runnels, that the blood


s: That snaps and gapes; and high above them there,


s: My master's pride, a cobwebbed, yellow pot


s: Still moan among the low sweet purple clover,


s: Endlessly many?  Still in deep-hushed woods,


s: Comes like a living wind through sleep-bowed branches,


s: Still steal dark shapes from the enchanted glens,


s: Which yet are purple with high dreams, and still


s: Which is much more than Peace, does there still stand


s: One sharp black shadow -- and the short, smooth horns


s: I, I have praised thee, yet I do not know


s: What moves my mind so strangely, save that once


s: And watched the slow clouds pass like heaped-up foam


s: Across blue marble, till at last no speck


s: Blotted the clear expanse, and the full moon


s: Rose in much light, and all night long I saw


s: Her ordered progress, till, in midmost heaven,


s: There came a terrible silence, and the mice


s: Crept to their holes, the crickets did not chirp,


s: All the small night-sounds stopped -- and clear pure light


s: Most cold and bleak; and yet my heart beat fast,


s: Waiting until the stillness broke.  I know not


s: For what I waited -- something very great --


s: A brittle crackling should clash suddenly


s: Against the quiet, and a black line creep


s: Until the broken heavens streamed apart,


s: Like torn lost banners, and the immortal fires,


s: Roaring like lions, asked their meat from God.


s: Of quivering, watery whiteness.  The hush held


s: And then it seemed that something far too great


s: Rent the dark sky like lightning, and I fell,


s: And, falling, heard a wild and rushing wind


s: Of music, and saw lights that blinded me


s: With white, impenetrable swords, and felt


s: Upon my eyelids -- and since then I cough


s: At times, and have strange thoughts about the stars,


s: My master will be back soon.  Let me light


s: Like a dead god incensed by chanting priests,


s: And watch the pungent smoke wreathe up and up,


s: Until he comes -- though he may rage because


s: They cost good money.  Then I shall walk home


s: Above the world's edge.  By the time he comes


s: She will be fully risen. --  There's his step!


s: The last pose flickered, failed.  The screen's dead white


s: Glared in a sudden flooding of harsh light


s: Stabbing the eyes; and as I stumbled out


s: The curtain rose.  A fat girl with a pout


s: And legs like hams, began to sing "His Mother".


s: Gusts of bad air rose in a choking smother;


s: Smoke, the wet steam of clothes, the stench of plush,


s: Powder, cheap perfume, mingled in a rush.


s: I stepped into the lobby -- and stood still


s: Cleanness and rapture -- excellence made plain --


s: The storming, thrashing arrows of the rain!


s: Pouring and dripping on the roofs and rods,


s: Smelling of woods and hills and fresh-turned sods,


s: Black on the sidewalks, gray in the far sky,


s: Crashing on thirsty panes, on gutters dry,


s: Hurrying the crowd to shelter, making fair


s: The streets, the houses, and the heat-soaked air, --


s: Merciful, holy, charging, sweeping, flashing,


s: It smote the soul with a most iron clashing!...


s: Like dragons' eyes the street-lamps suddenly gleamed,


s: Yellow and round and dim-low globes of flame.


s: And, scarce-perceived, the clouds' tall banners streamed.


s: Beauty strove suddenly, and rose, and flowered....


s: I gripped my coat and plunged where awnings lowered.


s: Made one with hissing blackness, caught, embraced,


s: By splendor and by striving and swift haste --


s: Spring coming in with thunderings and strife --


s: I stamped the ground in the strong joy of life!


s: Since last I saw them, blind with tears.


s: Their welcome like the hills stood fast:


s: Where the raw streets stretched sullenly


s: Which shall endure though all things cease,


s: And there's the dawn, poured out like wine


s: We have our heaven on earth -- sometimes!


s: The boat ploughed on.  Now Alcatraz was past


s: And all the grey waves flamed to red again


s: At the dead sun's last glimmer.  Far and vast


s: Had scrawled vague lines of gold across the hills;


s: The sky was like a cup some rare wine fills,


s: One splendid instant -- back in the great room,


s: Curled in a chair with all of them beside


s: And the whole world a rush of happy voices,


s: With laughter beating in a clamorous tide....


s: Up to the empty sky in threads like glass,


s: And ran, and was a part of what rejoices


s: In thunderous nights of rain; lay in the grass


s: Sun-baked and tired, looking through a maze


s: Once more knew eves of perfume, days ablaze


s: With clear, dry heat on the brown, rolling fields;


s: Over a book of knights and bloody shields...


s: The ship slowed, jarred and stopped.  There, straight ahead,


s: Were dock and fellows.  Stumbling, he was whirled


s: Out and away to meet them -- and his back


s: Slumped to the old half-cringe, his hands fell slack;


s: A big boy's arm went round him -- and a twist


s: Sent shattering pain along his tortured wrist,


s: As a voice cried, a bloated voice and fat,


s: "Why it's Miss Nancy!  Come along, you rat!"


s: Perhaps we go with wind and cloud and sun,


s: Perhaps with sunsets when the day is done,


s: All's one to me -- I do not greatly care;


s: So long as there are brown hills -- and a tree


s: Like a mad prophet in a land of dearth --


s: The vast monotonous breathing of the earth.


s: I have known hours, slow and golden-glowing,


s: Lovely with laughter and suffused with light,


s: O Lord, in such a time appoint my going,


s: When the hands clench, and the cold face grows white,


s: And the spark dies within the feeble brain,


s: Spilling its star-dust back to dust again.


s: "But, sir," I said, "they tell me the man is like to die!"


s: He woke up with a sick taste in his mouth


s: And lay there heavily, while dancing motes


s: Whirled through his brain in endless, rippling streams,


s: And a grey mist weighed down upon his eyes


s: After some time his blurred mind stumbled back


s: Air foul with wine; a shouting, reeling crowd


s: Of friends who dragged him, dazed and blind with drink


s: The steady mutter of his neighbor's voice,


s: And then... well, they had brought him home it seemed,


s: Since he awoke in bed -- oh, damn the business!


s: He had not wanted it -- the silly jokes,


s: "One last, great night of freedom ere you're married!"


s: "You'll get no fun then!"  "H-ssh, don't tell that story!


s: He'll have a wife soon!" -- God! the sitting down


s: She came into his thoughts.  That was the worst.


s: His friends were fools....  He was not fit to touch,


s: To see, oh far, far off, that silver place


s: Where God stood manifest to man in her....


s: Fouling himself....  One thing he brought to her,


s: At least.  He had been clean; had taken it


s: A kind of point of honor from the first...


s: Others might do it... but he didn't care


s: And something seemed to grow within his mind....


s: Something was wrong -- the color of the wall --


s: The queer shape of the bedposts -- everything


s: Was changed, somehow... his room.  Was this his room?


s: ... He turned his head -- and saw beside him there


s: The sagging body's slope, the paint-smeared face,


s: And the loose, open mouth, lax and awry,


s: The breasts, the bleached and brittle hair... these things.


s: ... As if all Hell were crushed to one bright line


s: Of lightning for a moment.  Then he sank,


s: And bitter loathing crept up all his limbs.


s: Writhing like streams, like twisted charms


s: Steel-strong and fierce and glimmering wan,


s: And there were flowers, and jugs, bright-glancing,


s: Bunched sticks that burst their string and wrapping


s: And fall like jackstraws; green and blue


s: With still, fierce heat and ugly smoke....


s: And theirs, all theirs, came like a sword,


s: And then sinks back to night.  Slow, slow,


s: And still as Death, came Sleep and Death


s: Tall and like trees.  Like sweet and fire


s: Gently.  And there were no more pains....


s: Though Sleep and Death were whispering low.


s: Throbbing with torture -- and I crawled.


s: How red it was!  Black tree-roots clutched


s: And tore -- and soon the snow was smutched


s: That rolled and gashed men as they fell.


s: Once, and fell blind, and heard her cry...


s: Somewhere, in Heaven she walks that road.


s: The little letters dance across the page,


s: Flaunt and retire, and trick the tired eyes;


s: Sick of the strain, the glaring light, I rise


s: Yawning and stretching, full of empty rage


s: At the dull maunderings of a long dead sage,


s: Fling up the windows, fling aside his lies;


s: Choosing to breathe, not stifle and be wise,


s: The breeze blows cool and there are stars and stars


s: Beyond the dark, soft masses of the elms


s: That whisper things in windy tones and light.


s: They seem to wheel for dim, celestial wars;


s: And I -- I hear the clash of silver helms


s: Ring icy-clear from the far deeps of night.


s: Tobacco smoke drifts up to the dim ceiling


s: Curling in endless shapes, in blue rings wheeling,


s: As formless as our talk.  Phil, drawling, bets


s: While Bob and Mac discuss the Giants' chances;


s: Deep in a morris-chair, Bill scowls at "Falk",


s: John gives large views about the last few dances.


s: And so it goes -- an idle speech and aimless,


s: The empty words the gleam of a beauty tameless,


s: Friendship and peace and fire to strike men blind,


s: Till the whole world seems small and bright to hold --


s: Of all our youth this hour is pure gold.


s: I lie stretched out upon the window-seat


s: And doze, and read a page or two, and doze,


s: And feel the air like water on me close,


s: Great waves of sunny air that lip and beat


s: With a small noise, monotonous and sweet,


s: Against the window -- and the scent of cool,


s: Frail flowers by some brown and dew-drenched pool


s: This is the time of all-sufficing laughter


s: And there is neither past nor vague hereafter.


s: And drinks the light in like a liquid thing;


s: Filled with the divine languor of late spring.


s: "The College will reopen Sept. --."  `Catalogue'.


s: Torn in the yellow sandbags of their trench,


s: When something threw me sideways with a wrench,


s: And the skies seemed to shrivel like a scroll


s: And disappear... and propped against the bole


s: Of a big elm I lay, and watched the clouds


s: Float through the blue, deep sky in speckless crowds,


s: And I was clean again, and young, and whole.


s: Lord, what a dream that was!  And what a doze


s: Waiting for Bill to come along to class!


s: I've cut it now -- and he --  Oh, hello, Fred!


s: Why, what's the matter? -- here -- don't be an ass,


s: Sit down and tell me! --  What do you suppose?


s: I dreamed I... AM I... wounded?  "YOU ARE DEAD."


s: Alexander VI Dines with the Cardinal of Capua


s: With all its feathers.  Look, what gorgeous dyes


s: And how deep, lustrous greens are splashed and spilt


s: Along the back, that like a sea-wave's crest


s: Scatters soft beauty o'er th' emblazoned breast!


s: For feasts like this, whereby I honor one


s: Some wine?  Your goblet's empty?  Let it foam!


s: Rippled with lines that float like women's curls,


s: Fierce-glowing as a chalice in the Mass?


s: You start -- 'twas artist then, not Pope who spoke!


s: When poison writhes within.  A foolish tale!


s: Caraffa, fetch a silver cup!...  You own


s: A Birth of Venus, now -- or so I've heard,


s: Hewn with the lithe grace of Praxiteles;


s: A sultan; golden veils that drop like lawn --


s: Of your possessions, fortunate one!  Don't writhe


s: Now for the fruit!  Great peaches, satin-skinned,


s: Pomegranates red as lips -- oh they come dear!


s: But men like you we feast at any price --


s: A plum perhaps?  They're looking rather nice!


s: There's yours!  Now, with a one-side-poisoned knife


s: And leave one's friend with -- "fool" for epitaph!


s: An old trick?  Truth!  But when one has the itch


s: For pretty things and isn't very rich....


s: Be angry!  You feel giddy?  Well, it's hot!


s: Take home and smell -- it purges blood of bile!


s: And when you kiss Bianca's dimpled knee,


s: Ho there, the Cardinal's litter! --  You must dine


s: Even admire my frescoes -- though they're nought


s: Beside the calm Greek glories you have bought!


s: And take a weak man's blessing!  Help him there


s: Lucrezia here?  You're ready for the ball?


s: -- He'll die within ten hours, I suppose --


s: MhM!  Kiss your poor old father, little rose!


s: Birds, beasts, one thing alone they said,


s: Whispered and shouted, sneered and laughed,


s: Screamed out until my brain was daft....


s: One snaky word, "WHAT IF YOU'D DONE IT?"


s: There were not many at that lonely place,


s: Where two scourged hills met in a little plain.


s: The wind cried loud in gusts, then low again.


s: Three pines strained darkly, runners in a race


s: Unseen by any.  Toward the further woods


s: A dim harsh noise of voices rose and ceased.


s: -- We were most silent in those solitudes --


s: Then, sudden as a flame, the black-robed priest,


s: The clotted earth piled roughly up about


s: The hacked red oblong of the new-made thing,


s: Short words in swordlike Latin -- and a rout


s: Then, like a blind door shut on a carouse,


s: The terrible bareness of the soul's last house.


s: Soup should be heralded with a mellow horn,


s: Blowing clear notes of gold against the stars;


s: Strange entrees with a jangle of glass bars


s: Fish, by a plopping, gurgling rush of waters,


s: Clear, vibrant waters, beautifully austere;


s: Roast, with a thunder of drums to stun the ear,


s: A screaming fife, a voice from ancient slaughters!


s: Then the green silence of many watercresses;


s: Coffee, a slow, low singing no passion stresses;


s: Such are my thoughts as -- clang! crash! bang! -- I brood


s: And gorge the sticky mess these fools call food!


s: (Down by the marsh the hemp grows rank).


s: The weight of his hand held hard the downs.


s: And the merchants cursed him, bitter and black,


s: Was all of their ships that might come back.


s: "The hemp that shall hang me is not grown!"


s: And the rope that dragged him down to hell.


s: The fight was done, and the gutted ship,


s: Stripped like a shark the sea-gulls strip,


s: White as the sky when a white squall nears,


s: Where the sea shook and the gulf yawned blank,


s: They shrieked and struggled and dropped and sank,


s: Of his great plantations, flung out wide


s: Like a purple cloak, was a full month's ride.


s: Trapped like a hare in the toils that day.


s: He sat at wine in his gold and his lace,


s: Hawk came near, and she covered her face.


s: He rode in the fields, and the hunt was brave,


s: A shriek that the seas cried out to hear,


s: And he could not see and he could not save.


s: And Hawk laughed, and he kissed her mouth,


s: And his eyes were hard gems in the gloom.


s: Where the green marsh creeps like a thing alive --


s: There at its edge, where the rushes thrive."


s: And the blacks shrink back and are sore afraid


s: For a cold wind blows from the marshland near,


s: And white things move, and the night grows drear,


s: And they chatter and crouch and are sick with fear.


s: But down by the marsh, where the gray slaves glean,


s: The hemp sprouts up, and the earth is seen


s: And his eyes are hard and dull like stone.


s: But down where the fireflies are like eyes,


s: And the damps shudder, and the mists rise,


s: The hemp-stalks stand up toward the skies.


s: And down from the poop of the pirate ship


s: A body falls, and the great sharks grip.


s: And Hawk laughs loud as the corpse is thrown,


s: "The hemp that shall hang me is not grown!"


s: And the hemp falls down by the stagnant stream.


s: Swooping to pounce in the Northern seas.


s: And white as his hand is grown his hair.


s: But down by the marsh in the blazing sun


s: The hemp is smoothed and twisted and spun,


s: (Down by the marsh the hemp grows rank).


s: And the ships that saw him came not back.


s: And once again, where the wide tides ran,


s: From her hidden ports, and a hidden crew,


s: Lacking his great ship through and through.


s: And the boarders slew his crew like sheep.


s: Hawk stood up straight, his breast to the steel;


s: "The hemp is grown, and my word made good!"


s: And the cutlass clanged with a hissing whir


s: Hawk roared and charged like a maddened buck.


s: And the cutlass shivered to sparks and dust.


s: Sir Henry stood on the blood-stained deck,


s: Then from the hatch, where the rent decks slope,


s: Where the dead roll and the wounded grope,


s: The sky was blue, and the sea was still,


s: The doomed man's cries were little and shrill.


s: Like a wind-blown fruit between sea and sun,


s: And there was nought between sea and sun --


s: Nought but the sun and the sky and the sea.


s: But down by the marsh where the fever breeds,


s: For the hemp clings fast to a dead man's throat,


s: Well, I was tired of life; the silly folk,


s: The tiresome noises, all the common things


s: I loved once, crushed me with an iron yoke.


s: I longed for the cool quiet and the dark,


s: Under the common sod where louts and kings


s: Lie down, serene, unheeding, careless, stark,


s: Filled with the ecstasy of being dead....


s: And pulled the trigger hard -- I felt no pain,


s: No pain at all; the pistol had missed fire


s: I thought; then, looking at the floor, I saw


s: Swept over me.  I trembled -- and looked up.


s: About me was -- not that, my heart's desire,


s: That small and dark abode of death and peace --


s: But all from which I sought a vain release!


s: My last state ten times worse than was my first.


s: Helpless I stood, befooled, betrayed, accursed,


s: No further doors to break or bars to burst!


s: Here, where men's eyes were empty and as bright


s: As the blank windows set in glaring brick,


s: When the wind strengthens from the sea -- and night


s: Drops like a fog and makes the breath come thick;


s: By the deserted paths, the vacant halls,


s: One may see figures, twisted shades and lean,


s: Like the mad shapes that crawl an Indian screen,


s: Or paunchy smears you find on prison walls.


s: Turn the knob gently!  There's the Thumbless Man,


s: Still weaving glass and silk into a dream,


s: Although the wall shows through him -- and the Khan


s: -- Chilly the grave-smell comes from the turned sod --


s: Come -- lift the curtain -- and be cold before


s: The silence of the eight men who were God!


s: As he mumbles in his corner, the shadow deepens upon him;


s: Dark huddled coilings from the obscene depths,


s: Orange light drips from the guttering candles,


s: Eddying over the vast embroideries of the bed


s: Retreating before the sable impending gloom of the canopy


s: With a swift thrust and sparkle of gold,


s: Rippling back abashed before the ominous silences


s: Like the swift turns and starts of an overpowered fencer


s: I am Aumaury de Montreuil; once quick, soon to be eaten of worms.


s: Sleep on the carven shields and knots at the foot of the bed,


s: Oozing, blurring outlines, obliterating colors,


s: It does not hear -- that shadow crouched in the corner...


s: One might think so indeed, save for the calm face, yellow as wax,


s: Out of the drowsy fog my body creeps back to me.


s: Moonlight, watery, pellucid, lifeless, ripples over the world.


s: The grass beneath it is gray; the stars pale in the sky.


s: All is purity, without color, without stir, without passion.


s: My hair stands on end.  I cannot stir.  I cannot speak.


s: It is terror, terror that is walking the pale sick gardens


s: And the eyeless face no man may see and live!


s: It is so long ago that she died, so long ago!


s: Dust crushes her, earth holds her, mold grips her.


s: Fiends, do you not know that she is dead?...


s: The beauty, the passion, the perilous madness --


s: Moonlight she was, and her body of moonlight and foam,


s: She blew me a kiss from her hand like a drifting white blossom --


s: Underneath the window a peacock screams,


s: Like little lacquered boots on the rough stone.


s: The aching presence of the beloved's beauty!


s: The wisdom, the incense, the brightness!


s: Once more on the ice-bright floor they danced the pavon


s: But I turned to the garden and her from the lighted candles.


s: Softly I trod the lush grass between the black hedges of box.


s: Softly, for I should take her unawares and catch her arms,


s: By the arbor all the moonlight flowed in silver


s: When my sword was where her head had lain


s: But turned to me with one pale hand uplifted,


s: All her satins fiery with the starshine,


s: Nacreous, shimmering, weeping, iridescent,


s: Like the quivering plumage of a peacock...


s: Then her head drooped and I gripped her hair,


s: Oh soft, scented cloud across my fingers! --


s: Blood writhed on my hands; I trod in blood....


s: At that crumpled heap of silk and moonlight,


s: Where like twitching pinions, an arm twisted,


s: All its plumage fiery with the starshine,


s: It drifts across the floor and mounts the bed,


s: Its quick beak thrusting, rending, devil's crimson...


s: Screams, great tortured screams shake the dark canopy.


s: The light flickers, the shadow in the corner stirs;


s: The little man with the vague beard and guise


s: Pulled at the wicket.  "Come inside!" he said,


s: "I'll show you all we've got now -- it was size


s: You wanted? -- oh, dry colors!  Well" -- he led


s: And pulled one fiercely.  Violent and bold


s: Scarlet screamed out above the battered gold


s: Of tins and picture-frames.  I held my breath.


s: He tugged another hard -- and sapphire skies


s: Spread in vast quietude, serene as death,


s: O'er waves like crackled turquoise -- and my eyes


s: Burnt with the blinding brilliance of calm sea!


s: "We're selling that lot there out cheap!" said he.


s: I am a shell.  From me you shall not hear


s: The splendid tramplings of insistent drums,


s: The orbed gold of the viol's voice that comes,


s: Heavy with radiance, languorous and clear.


s: Yet, if you hold me close against the ear,


s: The thunderous beat and passion of the sea,


s: The slow surge of the tides that drown the mere.


s: Others with subtle hands may pluck the strings,


s: That moves, not of itself, and moving sings;


s: Leaving a fragrance, faint as wine new-shed,


s: A tremulous murmur from great days long dead.


s: From the black pools of seething oil....


s: Those little devils are!  They've stolen the pitchfork


s: From Bel, there, as he slept... Look! -- oh look, look!


s: Lord, how he squeals!  Stop it... it's, well -- indecent!


s: But funny!...  See, Bel's waked.  They'll catch it now!


s: ... Eternally that stifling reek arises,


s: Blotting the dome with smoky, terrible towers,


s: Black, strangling trees, whispering obscene things


s: Amongst their branches, clutching with maimed hands,


s: Up to the gates; higher than that heaped brick


s: Man piled to smite the sun.  And all around


s: Are devils.  One can laugh... but that hunched shape


s: The face one stone, like those Assyrian kings!


s: One sees in carvings, watching men flayed red


s: Horribly laughable in leaps and writhes;


s: That face -- utterly evil, clouded round


s: With evil like a smoke -- it turns smiles sour!


s: ... And Nero there, the flabby cheeks astrain


s: For ever... well... it droops the mouth.  Till I


s: There's one blue patch no smoke dares touch.


s: Sky, clear, ineffable, alive with light,


s: ... It seems so quaint she should have long gold wings.


s: Her breast, or fluttering with fierce, pure light,


s: Like shaken steel.  Her crown too.  Well, it's queer!


s: And then she never cared much for the harp


s: All passionate desires, the eloquent thunder


s: Of new, glad suns, shouting aloud for joy,


s: Over fresh worlds and clean, trampling the air


s: Like stooping hawks, to the long wind of horns,


s: And she is the low lake, drowsy and gentle,


s: And good words spoken from the tongues of friends,


s: And calmness in the evening, and deep thoughts,