s: I should delight to have my curls half drown'd


s: In Tyrian dews, and head with roses crown'd:


s: And once more yet, ere I am laid out dead,


s: Twice five-and-twenty, bate me but one year;


s: Long I have lasted in this world; 'tis true


s: But yet those years that I have lived, but few.


s: Who by his gray hairs doth his lustres tell,


s: Lives not those years, but he that lives them well:


s: One man has reach'd his sixty years, but he


s: Of all those three-score has not lived half three:


s: He lives who lives to virtue; men who cast


s: Their ends for pleasure, do not live, but last.


s: Where fortune bears no sway o'er things,


s: A sacred laurel springing from my grave:


s: Weep for the dead, for they have lost this light;


s: And weep for me, lost in an endless night;


s: Or mourn, or make a marble verse for me,


s: Lost to the world; lost to myself; alone


s: Here now I rest under this marble stone,


s: In depth of silence, heard and seen of none.


s: Laid out for dead, let thy last kindness be


s: With leaves and moss-work for to cover me;


s: And while the wood-nymphs my cold corpse inter,


s: Sing thou my dirge, sweet-warbling chorister!


s: For epitaph, in foliage, next write this:


s: --The first act's doubtful, but (we say)


s: Who for some sweet-heart's sake, did prove


s: That died for love, and their complaints;


s: --Thou fool, said Love, know'st thou not this?


s: There thou shalt find her lip and cheek;


s: For as these flowers, thy joys must die;


s: Like those short sweets here knit together.


s: Which, though enchased with pearls, contain


s: As shews the air when with a rain-bow graced,


s: So smiles that ribbon 'bout my Julia's waist;


s: Or like----Nay, 'tis that Zonulet of love,


s: Wherein all pleasures of the world are wove.


s: How rich and pleasing thou, my Julia, art,


s: First, for thy Queen-ship on thy head is set


s: A golden ring, that shines upon thy thumb;


s: Between thy breasts, than down of swans more white,


s: There plays the Sapphire with the Chrysolite.


s: No part besides must of thyself be known,


s: Some ask'd how Pearls did grow, and where:


s: For some fresh, fragrant, luscious flowers,


s: They blush'd, and look'd more fresh than flowers


s: Since ghost there's none to affright thee.


s: Then weep not, Sweet, but thus much know,--


s: When that day comes, whose evening says I'm gone


s: Those deities which circum-walk the seas,


s: For one drink-offering poured out by thee,


s: Mercy and Truth live with thee!  and forbear,


s: In my short absence, to unsluice a tear;


s: But yet for love's-sake, let thy lips do this,--


s: Give my dead picture one engendering kiss;


s: Work that to life, and let me ever dwell


s: In thy remembrance, Julia.  So farewell.


s: I have been wanton, and too bold, I fear,


s: To chafe o'er-much the virgin's cheek or ear;--


s: Grace with the gods who's sorry for his sin.


s: That done, my Julia, dearest Julia, come,


s: My fates are ended; when thy Herrick dies,


s: Clasp thou his book, then close thou up his eyes.


s: A thousand thorns, and briars, and stings


s: Yet ne'er can see that salve which brings


s: So that the more I look, the more I prove


s: There's still more cause why I the more should love.


s: Anthea laugh'd, and, fearing lest excess


s: Might stretch the cords of civil comeliness


s: She with a dainty blush rebuked her face,


s: And call'd each line back to his rule and space.


s: You say I love not, 'cause I do not play


s: Still with your curls, and kiss the time away.


s: You blame me, too, because I can't devise


s: Some sport, to please those babies in your eyes;


s: By Love's religion, I must here confess it,


s: The most I love, when I the least express it.


s: Shall griefs find tongues; full casks are ever found


s: Deep waters noiseless are; and this we know,


s: That chiding streams betray small depth below.


s: So when love speechless is, she doth express


s: A depth in love, and that depth bottomless.


s: Now, since my love is tongueless, know me such,


s: Who speak but little, 'cause I love so much.


s: To my revenge, and to her desperate fears,


s: Fly, thou made bubble of my sighs and tears!


s: In the wild air, when thou hast roll'd about,


s: And, like a blasting planet, found her out;


s: Stoop, mount, pass by to take her eye--then glare


s: Next, when thou dost perceive her fixed sight


s: Then, like a globe, or ball of wild-fire, fly,


s: And break thyself in shivers on her eye!


s: My kiss out-went the bounds of shamefacedness:--


s: None is discreet at all times; no, not Jove


s: Himself, at one time, can be wise and love.


s: Let us, though late, at last, my Silvia, wed;


s: Thy watch may stand, my minutes fly post haste;


s: No sound calls back the year that once is past.


s: Then, sweetest Silvia, let's no longer stay;


s: Away with doubts, all scruples hence remove!


s: No man, at one time, can be wise, and love.


s: We two are last in hell; what may we fear


s: To be tormented or kept pris'ners here I


s: Alas!  if kissing be of plagues the worst,


s: We'll wish in hell we had been last and first.


s: You say you're sweet:  how should we know


s: Which, star-like, sparkle in their skies;


s: All hearts your captives, yours, yet free;


s: Yet there's a way found, if thou please,


s: That heart to bleed, your's ne'er will ache


s: Languish and look, but thy return see never.


s: My lips shall send a thousand back to you.


s: Three zodiacs fill'd more, I shall stoop;


s: Then, while thou laugh'st, I'll sighing cry,


s: Now is the time when all the lights wax dim;


s: And thou, Anthea, must withdraw from him


s: Where, though thou see'st not, thou may'st think upon


s: Or, for mine honour, lay me in that tomb


s: In which thy sacred reliques shall have room;


s: For my embalming, Sweetest, there will be


s: No spices wanting, when I'm laid by thee.


s: One night i'th' year, my dearest Beauties, come,


s: And bring those dew-drink-offerings to my tomb;


s: When thence ye see my reverend ghost to rise,


s: And there to lick th' effused sacrifice,


s: Though paleness be the livery that I wear,


s: Trust me, I will not hurt ye, or once show


s: The least grim look, or cast a frown on you;


s: Nor shall the tapers, when I'm there, burn blue.


s: This I may do, perhaps, as I glide by,--


s: Cast on my girls a glance, and loving eye;


s: Or fold mine arms, and sigh, because I've lost


s: The world so soon, and in it, you the most:


s: --Than these, no fears more on your fancies fall,


s: Though then I smile, and speak no words at all.


s: Ah, my Perilla!  dost thou grieve to see


s: Me, day by day, to steal away from thee?


s: Age calls me hence, and my gray hairs bid come,


s: 'Twill not be long, Perilla, after this,


s: That I must give thee the supremest kiss:--


s: Dead when I am, first cast in salt, and bring


s: Part of the cream from that religious spring,


s: With which, Perilla, wash my hands and feet;


s: That done, then wind me in that very sheet


s: Which wrapt thy smooth limbs, when thou didst implore


s: The Gods' protection, but the night before;


s: Let fall a primrose, and with it a tear:


s: Then lastly, let some weekly strewings be


s: Then shall my ghost not walk about, but keep


s: Still in the cool and silent shades of sleep.


s: That where you grew, scarce man can say.


s: Yet lost, ere that chaste flesh and blood


s: And this same flower that smiles to-day,


s: Let others to the printing-press run fast;


s: Since after death comes glory, I'll not haste.


s: All has been plunder'd from me but my wit:


s: Things are uncertain; and the more we get,


s: No man such rare parts hath, that he can swim,


s: Praise, they that will, times past: I joy to see


s: Myself now live; this age best pleaseth me!


s: Want is a softer wax, that takes thereon,


s: 'Tis sweet to think on what was hard t'endure.


s: When words we want, Love teacheth to indite;


s: And what we blush to speak, she bids us write.


s: Flash'd out between the middle and extreme.


s: Though frankincense the deities require,


s: We must not give all to the hallow'd fire.


s: Such be our gifts, and such be our expense,


s: As for ourselves to leave some frankincense.


s: When all birds else do of their music fail,


s: Money's the still-sweet-singing nightingale!


s: Knew'st thou one month would take thy life away,


s: Thou'dst weep; but laugh, should it not last a day.


s: Tears, though they're here below the sinner's brine,


s: Above, they are the Angels' spiced wine.


s: Love's of itself too sweet; the best of all


s: Is, when love's honey has a dash of gall.


s: Great cities seldom rest; if there be none


s: T' invade from far, they'll find worse foes at home.


s: Those ends in war the best contentment bring,


s: Whose peace is made up with a pardoning.


s: Twixt truth and error, there's this difference known


s: Dread not the shackles; on with thine intent,


s: Good wits get more fame by their punishment.


s: Man may want land to live in; but for all


s: Man's fortunes are according to his pains.


s: Drink wine, and live here blitheful while ye may;


s: The morrow's life too late is; Live to-day.


s: True mirth resides not in the smiling skin;


s: In prayer the lips ne'er act the winning part


s: Without the sweet concurrence of the heart.


s: Love is a circle, that doth restless move


s: Here we are all, by day; by night we're hurl'd


s: By dreams, each one into a several world.


s: In man, ambition is the common'st thing;


s: What though the sea be calm?  Trust to the shore;


s: Ships have been drown'd, where late they danced before.


s: Men say you're fair; and fair ye are, 'tis true;


s: But, hark!  we praise the painter now, not you.


s: Good things, that come of course, far less do please


s: Than those which come by sweet contingencies.


s: Let's live in haste; use pleasures while we may;


s: Could life return, 'twould never lose a day.


s: Nothing comes free-cost here; Jove will not let


s: His gifts go from him, if not bought with sweat.


s: Man knows where first he ships himself; but he


s: Never can tell where shall his landing be.


s: Great men by small means oft are overthrown;


s: He's lord of thy life, who contemns his own.


s: The first of nature, and the next of art;


s: Man is a watch, wound up at first, but never


s: Wound up again; Once down, he's down for ever.


s: The watch once down, all motions then do cease;


s: The man's pulse stopt, all passions sleep in peace.


s: I ask'd thee oft what poets thou hast read,


s: And lik'st the best?  Still thou repli'st, The dead.


s: --I shall, ere long, with green turfs cover'd be;


s: Then sure thou'lt like, or thou wilt envy, me.


s: Live by thy Muse thou shalt, when others die,


s: When monarchies trans-shifted are, and gone,


s: Troth, leave the flowers, and maids, take me!


s: More wealth brings in than all those three.


s: Down, and half drown'd me with the same;


s: The blooms that fell were white and red;


s: Where most sweets are, there lies a snake;


s: But those have thorns, and these have stings.


s: Some hung the head, while some did bring,


s: Gave them hearts-ease turn'd to flowers.


s: Such pretty flowers, like to orphans young,


s: To speak by tears, before ye have a tongue.


s: Speak, whimp'ring younglings, and make known


s: That things of greatest, so of meanest worth,


s: Conceived with grief are, and with tears brought forth.


s: She smiling blush'd, and blushing smiled,


s: --So though you're white as swan or snow,


s: Yet, when your lawns and silks shall flow,


s: And when, though long, it comes to pass,


s: Ah!  then too late, close in your chamber keeping,


s: And seeing her not dead, but all disleaved,


s: He chirpt for joy, to see himself deceived.


s: Which done, to still their wanton cries,


s: She kiss'd and wiped their dove-like eyes,


s: Fly to my mistress, pretty pilfering bee,


s: And say thou bring'st this honey-bag from me;


s: When on her lip thou hast thy sweet dew placed,


s: Mark if her tongue but slyly steal a taste;


s: If so, we live; if not, with mournful hum,


s: Toll forth my death; next, to my burial come.


s: Or else, sweet nymphs, do you but this--


s: These springs were maidens once that loved,


s: Turn'd to these springs which we see here:


s: When of the banks their leave they take,


s: Touch'd every where with such diffused grace,


s: Keeps line for line with beauty's parallels.


s: I bring ye love.  QUES. What will love do?


s: A Gyges ring they bear about them still,


s: To be, and not seen when and where they will;


s: They tread on clouds, and though they sometimes fall,


s: They fall like dew, and make no noise at all:


s: And air-like, leave no pression to be seen


s: Where'er they met, or parting place has been.


s: CHOR.  And makes more soft the bridal bed.


s: CHOR.  And stills the bride, too, when she cries.


s: It frisks and flies, now here, now there:


s: CHOR.  And here, and there, and every where.


s: Part your join'd lips, then speaks your kiss;


s: CHOR.  And this Love's sweetest language is.


s: CHOR.  Love honey yields, but never stings.


s: His passage through that dreadful shade,


s: Let what is graceless, discomposed, and rude,


s: With sweetness, smoothness, softness be endued:


s: Teach it to blush, to curtsey, lisp, and show


s: Demure, but yet full of temptation, too.


s: Numbers ne'er tickle, or but lightly please,


s: Unless they have some wanton carriages:--


s: This if ye do, each piece will here be good


s: And graceful made by your neat sisterhood.


s: Charms, that call down the moon from out her sphere,


s: On this sick youth work your enchantments here!


s: Bind up his senses with your numbers, so


s: As to entrance his pain, or cure his woe.


s: Fall gently, gently, and a-while him keep


s: That done, then let him, dispossess'd of pain,


s: Like to a slumbering bride, awake again.


s: Music, thou queen of heaven, care-charming spell,


s: Thou that tam'st tigers, and fierce storms, that rise,


s: Fall down, down, down, from those thy chiming spheres


s: To charm our souls, as thou enchant'st our ears.


s: The mellow touch of music most doth wound


s: The soul, when it doth rather sigh, than sound.


s: Begin to charm, and as thou strok'st mine ears


s: With thine enchantment, melt me into tears.


s: Then let thy active hand scud o'er thy lyre,


s: And make my spirits frantic with the fire;


s: That done, sink down into a silvery strain,


s: And make me smooth as balm and oil again.


s: Rare is the voice itself:  but when we sing


s: To th' lute or viol, then 'tis ravishing.


s: 'Tis thou that crown'st my glittering hearth


s: When with the virgin morning thou dost rise,


s: Crossing thyself come thus to sacrifice;


s: First wash thy heart in innocence; then bring


s: Pure hands, pure habits, pure, pure every thing.


s: Next to the altar humbly kneel, and thence


s: Give up thy soul in clouds of frankincense.


s: Thy golden censers fill'd with odours sweet


s: Shall make thy actions with their ends to meet.


s: When lutes and harps shall stroke the ear.


s: First offer incense; then, thy field and meads


s: Shall smile and smell the better by thy beads.


s: The spangling dew dredged o'er the grass shall be


s: Turn'd all to mell and manna there for thee.


s: Butter of amber, cream, and wine, and oil,


s: Shall run as rivers all throughout thy soil.


s: Would'st thou to sincere silver turn thy mould?


s: --Pray once, twice pray; and turn thy ground to gold.


s: Those strong-hoof'd mules, which we behold


s: --All these, and more, shall then afford


s: Life is the body's light; which, once declining,


s: Those crimson clouds i' th' cheeks and lips leave shining:-


s: Those counter-changed tabbies in the air,


s: The sun once set, all of one colour are:


s: So, when death comes, fresh tinctures lose their place,


s: And dismal darkness then doth smutch the face.


s: And fresh thy hearse-cloth, we will here


s: Receive, for this thy praise, our tears;


s: 'Tis we are dead, though not i' th' grave;


s: May sweets grow here, and smoke from hence


s: No boisterous winds or storms come hither,


s: Thy soft sweet earth; but, like a spring,


s: Come forth to strew thy tomb with flowers;


s: Clean wash'd, and laid out for the bier.


s: From whence the housewives' cloth did come;


s: Of those that prank it with their plumes,


s: Thy hands, though cold, yet spotless, white,


s: These were thy acts, and thou shalt have


s: Next, how I love thee, that my grief must tell,


s: Wherein thou liv'st for ever.--Dear, farewell!


s: When I consider, dearest, thou dost stay


s: Like to these garden glories, which here be


s: With grief of heart, methinks, I thus do cry,


s: Would thou hadst ne'er been born, or might'st not die!


s: I'll write no more of love, but now repent


s: Of all those times that I in it have spent.


s: I'll write no more of life, but wish 'twas ended,


s: And that my dust was to the earth commended.


s: O earth!  earth!  earth!  hear thou my voice, and be


s: Banish'd from thee I live;--ne'er to return,


s: Unless thou giv'st my small remains an urn.


s: Thou stop'st Saint Peter in the midst of sin;


s: A sin, than fall to weeping when 'tis done.


s: Gifts blind the wise, and bribes do please


s: Night hath no wings to him that cannot sleep;


s: And Time seems then not for to fly, but creep;


s: Slowly her chariot drives, as if that she


s: Had broke her wheel, or crack'd her axletree.


s: Just so it is with me, who list'ning, pray


s: The winds to blow the tedious night away,


s: That I might see the cheerful peeping day.


s: Sick is my heart; O Saviour!  do Thou please


s: Sleep not for ever in the vaults of death;


s: Let me thy voice betimes i' th' morning hear;


s: Call, and I'll come; say Thou the when and where:


s: Draw me but first, and after Thee I'll run,


s: And make no one stop till my race be done.


s: Lines longer than 78 characters are broken and the continuation


s: appear with the poems, instead of in a separate section.]


s: This edition of the `Select Poems of Sidney Lanier' is issued


s: To these as to older people, the poems will, it is believed,


s: The biographical section of the Introduction rests in the main


s: The poems are arranged, not as in the complete edition,


s: but in their chronological order, the only proper one, I think,


s: for a text-book.  Of course, they are all given complete.


s: * Later opinion generally agrees that "The Marshes of Glynn"


s: In the Notes I have made rather copious quotations from poems


s: familiar to English scholars, because I hope that this book


s: will go into the hands of many to whom they are not familiar,


s: and to whom the original texts are not easily accessible.


s: And yet, if they at all attain their end, the Notes must lead one


s: Among the friends that have helped me by counsel or otherwise


s: I gratefully name Mr. Clifford Lanier, brother of the poet;


s: Chief-justice Logan E. Bleckley, of Georgia, a man of letters


s: My chief indebtedness, however, is to Mrs. Sidney Lanier,


s: From the time of Queen Elizabeth to the Restoration,


s: distinguished for their love of oratory, music, and poetry.


s: * For the full title of works cited see `Bibliography'.


s: With such an ancestry we are not surprised to learn that


s: his power over which we shall hear of farther on.  At first,


s: a position that he held until the outbreak of the Civil War.


s: The lecture-room was now exchanged for the battle-field;


s: in April, 1861, Lanier entered the Confederate Army as a private


s: each seemed to vie with the other in brotherly love;


s: for, while both were offered promotion, neither would accept it,


s: since to do so would have entailed separation from the other.


s: The leisure time of his first year's service Sidney spent


s: in the study of music and the modern languages.  He was engaged


s: in several battles in Virginia, but afterward was transferred,


s: for the most part afoot, and reached home March 15th.


s: An account of his war-life is given in his novel, `Tiger-lilies',


s: * It is sometimes erroneously stated that each was put in charge


s: Against the son's devotion of his life to music and literature


s: the father protested, chiefly on business grounds, and begged him


s: and of a bare army and then of an exacting business life,


s: through all the discouragement of being wholly unacquainted


s: with literary people and literary ways -- I say, think how,


s: have steadily kept in my heart so that I could not banish them.


s: Does it not seem to you as to me, that I begin to have the right


s: to enroll myself among the devotees of these two sublime arts,


s: after having followed them so long and so humbly, and through


s: who henceforth devoted every energy to music and literature.


s: Despite continued ill-health, which now and again necessitated


s: for the Peabody Symphony Concerts, a position that he filled


s: with rare distinction for six years.  As to his literary work,


s: and kept up his musical engagement at the Peabody Concerts.


s: can be gathered from the following words of Mr. Ward:


s: going in a closed carriage and sitting during his lecture,


s: his strength was so exhausted that the struggle for breath


s: *2* They are named in the `Bibliography'.


s: ** Timrod's `A Vision of Poesy', stanza xliv.


s: Mr. Lanier left a family consisting of his wife and four sons.


s: Mrs. Lanier, who lives at Tryon, N.C., was the inspiration


s: with which he has been connected from its beginning.


s: He is the author of several graceful sketches in the magazines.


s: The second son, Sidney, is passionately fond of music,


s: hung the flute of Lanier, which had so often been his solace,


s: and a roll of his manuscript music.  The bust was crowned


s: was given to those who were present.  Upon its face was a wreath,


s: a flute with ivy twined about it."*3*  The exercises,


s: which were interspersed with music, were as follows:


s: Miss Susan Hayes Ward, of Newark, N.J.; a paper on Lanier's


s: in prose and verse, by Messrs. W. B. Hill, Hugh V. Washington,


s: is the steadily growing study devoted to Lanier's works.


s: upon the list of Harvard books to be kept only a fortnight,


s: given us an imaginative study of the character of Mr. Lanier.


s: *3* Gilman's `A Memorial of Sidney Lanier', pp. 5-6.


s: *6* See recent files of `The Independent' (New York).


s: that, according to the promise of the preface, he gives


s: * This may be found in Professor Tolman's article,


s: is "first, to inquire what is the special relation of the novel


s: in the personality of man" (p. 5); (2) that what we moderns


s: were inadequate to them; and that the resulting necessity


s: * Mrs. Lanier informs me that `The English Novel' will soon


s: be issued in an amended form and with a new sub-title,


s: of its seeming incompleteness as to scope.


s: But it is chiefly as a poet that we wish to consider Lanier,


s: what problems engaged his attention and how were they solved?


s: A careful investigation will show, I believe, that,


s: despite the brevity of his life and its consuming cares,


s: in the world of religion, of which so much has been heard,


s: "O Age that half believ'st thou half believ'st,


s: Half doubt'st the substance of thine own half doubt,


s: And, half perceiving that thou half perceiv'st,


s: Stand'st at thy temple door, heart in, head out!


s: Lo! while thy heart's within, helping the choir,


s: Without, thine eyes range up and down the time,


s: Blinking at o'er-bright Science, smit with desire


s: To see and not to see.  Hence, crime on crime.


s: Yea, if the Christ (called thine) now paced yon street,


s: Thy halfness hot with his rebuke would swell;


s: Legions of scribes would rise and run and beat


s: His fair intolerable Wholeness twice to hell."*


s: "O Trade! O Trade! would thou wert dead!


s: The Time needs heart -- 'tis tired of head."*


s: Then all the stringed instruments join with the violins in giving


s: "`We weave in the mills and heave in the kilns,


s: And thieve much gold from the Devil's bank tills,


s: To relieve, O God, what manner of ills? --


s: The beasts, they hunger, and eat, and die;


s: Hush, fellow-swine:  why nuzzle and cry?


s: And the kilns and the curt-tongued mills say "Go:


s: There's plenty that can, if you can't:  we know.


s: Move out, if you think you're underpaid.


s: The poor are prolific; we're not afraid;


s: Does business mean, "Die, you -- live, I"?


s: But Lanier had an eye for life's beauties as well as its ills.


s: he tells us that, while explorers say that they have found


s: some nations that had no god, he knows of none that had no music,


s: We have already seen incidentally that in his `Symphony'


s: In `To Beethoven' he describes the effect of music upon himself:


s: *2* Hayne's (P. H.) `A Poet's Letters to a Friend'.


s: I must get upon paper as many as possible of the poems


s: with which my heart is stuffed like a schoolboy's pocket."


s: in the hickory,*6* the dogwood,*6* and the live-oak;*7*


s: in the murmuring leaves*8* and the chattering streams;*9*


s: in the old red hills*10* and the sea;*11* in the clouds,*12*


s: "To me the meanest flower that blows can give


s: Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears;"*16*


s: and beside them one may put this line of Lanier's,


s: "The little green leaves would not let me alone in my sleep,"*17*


s: And how naive and tender was this nature-worship!  He speaks of


s: "The leaves that wave against my cheek caress


s: Like women's hands; the embracing boughs express


s: The copse-depths into little noises start,


s: That sound anon like beatings of a heart,


s: Anon like talk 'twixt lips not far apart;"*22*


s: Through something sweeter than all dreams


s: "Oh, what is abroad in the marsh and the terminal sea?


s: From the weighing of fate and the sad discussion of sin,


s: "By so many roots as the marsh-grass sends in the sod


s: I will heartily lay me a-hold on the greatness of God:


s: Oh, like to the greatness of God is the greatness within


s: The range of the marshes, the liberal marshes of Glynn."*24*


s: But to Lanier the ministration of nature was by no means passive;


s: "Ye lispers, whisperers, singers in storms,


s: Ye consciences murmuring faiths under forms,


s: Ye ministers meet for each passion that grieves,


s: Oh, rain me down from your darks that contain me


s: Wisdoms ye winnow from winds that pain me, --


s: That advise me of more than they bring, -- repeat


s: Me the woods-smell that swiftly but now brought breath


s: From the heaven-side bank of the river of death, --


s: Teach me the terms of silence, -- preach me


s: The passion of patience, -- sift me, -- impeach me, --


s: As ye hang with your myriad palms upturned in the air,


s: In this earnest ascription of spirituality to the leaves


s: *26* See his `Modern Painters', vol. v., part vi., chapter iv.,


s: and Scudder's note to the same in her `Introduction to Ruskin'


s: To take up his next theme, Lanier, like every true Teuton,


s: "So hath Trade withered up Love's sinewy prime,


s: Deem men their life an opal gray, where plays


s: The one red sweet of gracious ladies'-praise.


s: Now, comes a suitor with sharp prying eye --


s: Says, `Here, you lady, if you'll sell, I'll buy:


s: Come, heart for heart -- a trade?  What! weeping? why?'


s: Shame on such wooer's dapper-mercery!"*1*


s: In humble manliness should cry, `O Sweet!


s: I know not if thy heart my heart will greet:


s: Whate'er thy worshipful soft tongue shall say,


s: I'll kiss thine answer, be it yea or nay:


s: To be thy knight until my dying day.'"*2*


s: I imagine, too, that any wife that ever lived would be satisfied


s: "Dear eyes, dear eyes, and rare complete --


s: Being heavenly-sweet and earthly-sweet --


s: For when he frowns, 'tis then ye shine."*3*


s: Almost equally felicitous are these lines of `Acknowledgment':


s: "Somehow by thee, dear Love, I win content:


s: Thy Perfect stops th' Imperfect's argument."*4*


s: But the cleverest thing that Lanier has written of woman


s: "But thou within thyself, dear manifold heart,


s: Dost bind all epochs in one dainty fact.


s: I leapt the breadth of time in loving thee!"*5*


s: -- a scrap worthy to be placed beside Steele's "To love her


s: is a liberal education," which has often been declared


s: the happiest thing on the subject in the English language.


s: To Lanier there was but one thing that made life worth living,


s: and that was love.  Even the superficial reader must be struck


s: with the frequent use of the term in the poet's works,


s: Love for man, love for woman, love for God, -- these three chime


s: by as much as we love, by so much are we gods.  For God is love;


s: and could we love as He does, we could be as He is."*1*


s: To the same effect is his statement in `The English Novel':


s: `How Love Looked for Hell', Mind and Sense at Love's request


s: "When life's all love, 'tis life:  aught else, 'tis naught."*4*


s: It is but a short way from love to its source, -- God.


s: from `The Crystal', which closes with this invocation:


s: "But Thee, but Thee, O sovereign Seer of time,


s: But Thee, O poets' Poet, Wisdom's Tongue,


s: But Thee, O man's best Man, O love's best Love,


s: O all men's Comrade, Servant, King, or Priest, --


s: What IF or YET, what mole, what flaw, what lapse,


s: Even in torture's grasp, or sleep's, or death's --


s: Jesus, good Paragon, Thou Crystal Christ?"*2*


s: with a thrilling mystery of `potential activity', which dwells


s: in his large, open eye, teaches me new things.  I say to myself,


s: "I fled in tears from the men's ungodly quarrel about God.


s: I fled in tears to the woods, and laid me down on the earth.


s: A-calling angels with the cow-herd's call


s: "Who never turned his back, but marched breast forward,


s: Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph,


s: Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better,


s: *3* Hayne's `A Poet's Letters to a Friend'.


s: Perhaps I may append here a paragraph upon Lanier's criticisms


s: of other writers, for they seem to me acute in the extreme.


s: Despite the elaborate essays in defence of Whitman's poetry


s: the defect of `Paradise Lost' is pointed out:


s: Thee, Milton, those thy comic-dreadful wars


s: Where, armed with gross and inconclusive steel,


s: Few better things have been said of Langland than this, --


s: Of art hadst sung Piers Plowman to the top


s: Of English songs, whereof 'tis dearest, now


s: "Most wise, that yet, in finding Wisdom, lost


s: `The Crystal' abounds in such happy characterizations.


s: *2* See Symonds's `Walt Whitman:  A Study'.  London, 1893.


s: Of Lanier's felicitous choice of words we have already had


s: he is "a man of genius with a rare gift for the happy word."


s: and the description of a mocking-bird as


s: "Death's and truth's unlocking time."*6*


s: Moreover, it should be observed that Lanier frequently uses


s: significant compounds, -- a habit acquired, no doubt,


s: While in the main Lanier's sentence-construction is good,


s: occasionally his sentences are too long, as in `My Springs',


s: `To Bayard Taylor', and `Sunrise', in which we have sentences


s: To come to the figures of speech, one must be struck at once


s: while at another he addresses an old red hill of Georgia as


s: E'en pitying Spring, will vainly strive to cheer."*2*


s: and in the `Psalm of the West'.*5*  While I do not like a maze,


s: brilliant though it be and sweet, I must say that I prefer


s: "The tide's at full:  the marsh with flooded streams


s: Glimmers a limpid labyrinth of dreams;"*6*


s: and of the heavens reflected in the marsh waters:


s: "Each winding creek in grave entrancement lies


s: The marsh brags ten:  looped on his breast they lie."*7*


s: With your lapfuls of stars and dreams."*8*


s: Finally, the heaven itself is thus pictured:


s: "Now in each pettiest personal sphere of dew


s: The summ'd morn shines complete as in the blue


s: beside which must be hung this exquisite picture:


s: "The dew-drop morn may fall from off the petal of the sky."*10*


s: *3* See on this point the remarks of Professor Trent


s: As to versification, Lanier uses almost all the types of verse


s: the careful distribution of vowel-colors and the frequent use


s: of alliteration and of phonetic syzygy,*1* by which last is meant


s: whether initially, medially, or finally, as for instance


s: All of these phenomena are illustrated in Lanier's


s: `Song of the Chattahoochee', which has often been compared


s: to Tennyson's `The Brook', and which alone proves the author


s: or, more precisely, in simplicity.  This comes partly


s: from infelicitous sentence-construction, partly, perhaps,


s: has been unduly exaggerated.  Thus Mr. Gosse*1* declares


s: Lanier at times manifests the simplicity that is granted


s: only to genius of the highest order:  thus an English critic,*2*


s: Of littles that large life compound,'"*3*


s: For when he frowns, 'tis then ye shine,'*4*


s: as `Corn', `The Marshes of Glynn', and `Sunrise', are not simple;


s: too gross to hear and see what Lanier puts before them,


s: whereas a bit of patient listening and looking reveals delights


s: *5* It is to be hoped that these letters may yet be published.


s: I quote from one dated November 15, 1874.


s: If not always simple, Lanier is often forcible in the extreme,


s: the break of dawn and the rising of the sun.


s: Of the poet's marvelous euphony, `The Song of the Chattahoochee'


s: "But if his sense of beauty made him a peer of our great poets,


s: While most of Lanier's poems are in a serious strain,


s: that we do not wonder when we hear him declaring,


s: "And I am one with all the kinsmen things


s: the `Ballad of Trees and the Master' must touch all readers.


s: that it is the only time that he complained of his lot,


s: But cannot dream us bread?  Why, now, can I


s: Make, aye, create this fervid throbbing June


s: Out of the chill, chill matter of my soul,


s: Out of this same chill matter, no, not one


s: For Mary, though she starved upon my breast?'


s: And then he fell upon his couch, and sobbed,


s: And, late, just when his heart leaned o'er


s: The very edge of breaking, fain to fall,


s: It is now time to say a word about Lanier's theory of art,


s: "Each artist -- gift of terror! -- owns his will."*2*


s: But he accepts the responsibility reverently and confidently:


s: Sure of the Father, Self, and Love, alone."*3*


s: Again, the province of poetry is pointed out, as in `Clover':


s: "The artist's market is the heart of man;


s: The artist's price, some little good of man;"*1*


s: "Wilt ask, `What profit e'er a poet brings?'


s: To pollen thee and sting thee fertile."*2*


s: But it is in his prose works that Lanier has treated the matter


s: most at length, and to these I turn.  In the first place,


s: he insists that to be an artist one must know a great deal,


s: his environments, we must wonder at the vastness, the accuracy,


s: `The Science of English Verse', the motto of which is,


s: was ever written by instinct alone since the world began,"*


s: "For a good poet's made as well as born,


s: But Lanier clearly saw that no formal laws and no amount


s: yet if the lip have a certain fulness that hints of the flesh,


s: the great artist."*  By copious quotations Lanier then shows


s: that "many fine and beautiful souls appear after a while


s: with your beautiful creation, go forward in the clear conviction


s: that unless you are suffused -- soul and body, one might say --


s: (`Preface' to his edition of `Wordsworth's Poems'),


s: John Ruskin (`Stones of Venice', vol. iii., chap. iv.),


s: and Victor Hugo (`William Shakespeare', Book VI.).


s: Milton has somewhere said that in order to be a great poet


s: several other great poets.  Now of all English poets,


s: I will not recall his gentle yet heroic life amid drawbacks


s: almost unparalleled; for it is even sadder than it is beautiful.


s: It is my deliberate judgment that, while, as the poet says


s: in his `Life and Song', no singer has ever wholly lived


s: his minstrelsy, Lanier came so near it that we may fairly say,


s: And, for my part, I am as grateful for his noble private life


s: * Mr. Thayer puts it stronger:  "As a master of melodious metre


s: but the younger poet's treatment is as much his own


s: which is his most striking quality.  It may be doubted


s: And a wild heart, throbbing in the reed,


s: Should thrill its joy and trill its fret,


s: `Life and Song' is the fifth of a series of seven poems


s: published under the general heading of `Street-cries',


s: with the two stanzas following as an introduction:


s: "Their needs, as wares; one THUS, one SO:


s: -- But still come rain, and sun, and snow,


s: The remaining numbers of the series are:  1. `Remonstrance',


s: I can think of no more helpful comment on the subject of our poem


s: already alluded to in the `Introduction' (p. liv [Part VI]):


s: "And long it was not after, when I was confirmed in this opinion,


s: a composition and pattern of the best and honorablest things;


s: (see `Introduction', p. liv [Part VI]), is likewise made


s: That air same Jones, which lived in Jones,


s: He'd swear with a hundred sighs and groans,


s: Thus spouted Jones (whar folks could hear,


s: "More corn! more corn! MUST plant less ground,


s: Next year they'll do it:  reasonin's sound:


s: (And, cotton will fetch 'bout a dollar a pound),


s: The themes of this poem, the relative claims of corn and cotton


s: "And he lived pretty much by gittin' of loans,


s: And his mules was nuthin' but skin and bones,


s: And his hogs was flat as his corn-bread pones,


s: And he had 'bout a thousand acres o' land."


s: He sells his farm to Brown at a dollar and fifty cents an acre


s: Brown invites Jones in to dinner, but cannot refrain


s: To-day the woods are trembling through and through


s: With shimmering forms, that flash before my view,


s: Then melt in green as dawn-stars melt in blue.


s: The leaves that wave against my cheek caress


s: Like women's hands; the embracing boughs express


s: The copse-depths into little noises start,


s: That sound anon like beatings of a heart,


s: Anon like talk 'twixt lips not far apart.


s: The beech dreams balm, as a dreamer hums a song;


s: Through that vague wafture, expirations strong


s: Throb from young hickories breathing deep and long


s: With stress and urgence bold of prisoned spring


s: Now, since the dew-plashed road of morn is dry,


s: And heavenlier giving.  Like Jove's locks awry,


s: Rich-wreathe the spacious foreheads of great pines,


s: And breathe ambrosial passion from their vines.


s: I pray with mosses, ferns, and flowers shy


s: That hide like gentle nuns from human eye


s: I hear faint bridal-sighs of brown and green


s: As far lights fringe into a pleasant sheen.


s: Vague purports sweet, of inarticulate tone.


s: Dreaming of gods, men, nuns, and brides, between


s: To join their radiant amplitudes of green


s: I slowly move, with ranging looks that pass


s: Where sassafras, intrenched in brambles dense,


s: The march of culture, setting limb and thorn


s: There, while I pause, my fieldward-faring eyes


s: Take harvests, where the stately corn-ranks rise,


s: And large benignities and insights wise,


s: Thus, without theft, I reap another's field;


s: Thus, without tilth, I house a wondrous yield,


s: And heap my heart with quintuple crops concealed.


s: Look, out of line one tall corn-captain stands


s: Advanced beyond the foremost of his bands,


s: And hottest thicket of the battling hedge.


s: Thou lustrous stalk, that ne'er mayst walk nor talk,


s: Still shalt thou type the poet-soul sublime


s: That leads the vanward of his timid time


s: And sings up cowards with commanding rhyme --


s: Soul calm, like thee, yet fain, like thee, to grow


s: Soul homely, as thou art, yet rich in grace like thee,


s: That moves in gentle curves of courtesy;


s: Soul filled like thy long veins with sweetness tense,


s: Thou lift'st more stature than a mortal man's,


s: Yea, standest smiling in thy future grave,


s: Thine epitaph writ fair in fruitage eloquent,


s: From antique ashes, whose departed flame


s: Into thy vigorous substance thou hast wrought


s: Whate'er the hand of Circumstance hath brought;


s: So thou dost reconcile the hot and cold,


s: Thou took'st from all that thou mightst give to all.


s: O steadfast dweller on the selfsame spot


s: Where thou wast born, that still repinest not --


s: Type of the home-fond heart, the happy lot! --


s: Deeply thy mild content rebukes the land


s: Whose flimsy homes, built on the shifting sand


s: By swift engulfments of incalculable tides


s: Look, thou substantial spirit of content!


s: By restless-hearted children left to lie


s: Untended there beneath the heedless sky,


s: As barbarous folk expose their old to die.


s: Dwelt one I knew of old, who played at toil,


s: And gave to coquette Cotton soul and soil.


s: Scorning the slow reward of patient grain,


s: He sowed his heart with hopes of swifter gain,


s: Then sat him down and waited for the rain.


s: Lulled by smooth-rippling loans, in idle trance


s: He lay, content that unthrift Circumstance


s: Should plough for him the stony field of Chance.


s: Yea, gathering crops whose worth no man might tell,


s: He staked his life on games of Buy-and-Sell,


s: And turned each field into a gambler's hell.


s: Parleyed, excused, pleaded for longer grace;


s: Railed at the drought, the worm, the rust, the grass;


s: Protested ne'er again 'twould come to pass;


s: With many an `oh' and `if' and `but alas'


s: Parried or swallowed searching questions rude,


s: And kissed the dust to soften Dives's mood.


s: At last, small loans by pledges great renewed,


s: And buys with lavish hand his yearly store


s: Till his small borrowings will yield no more.


s: With bitter heart and ever-brooding mind


s: Fretted for news that made him fret again,


s: Snatched at each telegram of Future Sale,


s: And thrilled with Bulls' or Bears' alternate wail --


s: And thus from year to year, through hope and fear,


s: With many a curse and many a secret tear,


s: Striving in vain his cloud of debt to clear,


s: He woke to find his foolish dreaming past,


s: Of squandering scamps and quacks that lined his way


s: From rascal statesman down to petty knave;


s: Himself, at best, for all his bragging brave,


s: A gamester's catspaw and a banker's slave.


s: Then, worn and gray, and sick with deep unrest,


s: Old hill! old hill! thou gashed and hairy Lear


s: E'en pitying Spring, will vainly strive to cheer --


s: King, that no subject man nor beast may own,


s: And bring thee back into thy monarch state


s: Lo, through hot waverings of the August morn,


s: Thou givest from thy vasty sides forlorn


s: Ripe largesse lingering for some bolder heart


s: As stated elsewhere (`Introduction', p. xvii [Part I]),


s: In the first of his letters to the Hon. Logan E. Bleckley,


s: Chief-justice of Georgia, dated October 9, 1874, Lanier tells us


s: how he came to write `Corn':  "I enclose MS. of a poem


s: in which I have endeavored to carry some very prosaic matters


s: up to a loftier plane.  I have been struck with alarm


s: In the introductory note to `Jones's Private Argyment'


s: his unreserved judgment), Judge Bleckley continues:


s: "Now, for the general impression which your Ode has made upon me.


s: and you give its portrait with many touches of marvel and mystery


s: the form and tragic state of King Lear; you thus make it


s: as to call forth this commendation of Judge Bleckley, which,


s: but sometimes hard.  There is less idealization and more of


s: praise and thanksgiving at the end of `The Huskers',


s: "Drawn up in serried ranks across the fields


s: That, as we gaze, seem ever to increase,


s: With tasseled flags and sun-emblazoned shields,


s: The glorious army of earth's perfect peace."


s: both life-like pictures of plantation life, in his


s: into the sea-board levels' -- where `a man can find


s: In the heart of the Hills of Life, I know


s: Shot through with lights of stars and dawns,


s: -- My springs from out whose shining gray


s: That feed my life's bright Lake of Dreams.


s: Thronged, like two dove-cotes of gray doves,


s: With wife's and mother's and poor-folk's loves,


s: Dear eyes, dear eyes and rare complete --


s: For my appreciation of this tribute to the poet's wife


s: require a certain trim smugness and clean-shaven propriety


s: in the face and dress of a poem, and I must win a hearing


s: by conforming in some degree to these tyrannies, with a view


s: Other tributes to his wife are:  `In Absence', `Acknowledgment',


s: `One in Two', and `Two in One'; while she is referred to


s: "O Trade! O Trade! would thou wert dead!


s: The Time needs heart -- 'tis tired of head:


s: Grant thee, O Trade! thine uttermost hope:


s: Then, with a bridegroom's heart-beats trembling,


s: The poor, the poor, the poor, they stand


s: Where Art, sweet lark, translates the sky


s: `Each day, all day' (these poor folks say),


s: `In the same old year-long, drear-long way,


s: We weave in the mills and heave in the kilns,


s: And thieve much gold from the Devil's bank tills,


s: To relieve, O God, what manner of ills? --


s: The beasts, they hunger, and eat, and die;


s: Hush, fellow-swine:  why nuzzle and cry?


s: And the kilns and the curt-tongued mills say "Go:


s: There's plenty that can, if you can't:  we know.


s: Move out, if you think you're underpaid.


s: The poor are prolific; we're not afraid;


s: Does business mean, "Die, you -- live, I"?


s: Plainly the heart of a child could solve it."


s: And then, as when from words that seem but rude


s: Back in our heart's great dark and solitude,


s: Of long chords change-marked with sobbing --


s: Motherly sobbing, not distinctlier heard


s: Than half wing-openings of the sleeping bird,


s: Some dream of danger to her young hath stirred.


s: Then stirring and demurring ceased, and lo!


s: Every least ripple of the strings' song-flow


s: And made a great chord tranquil-surfaced so,


s: As a brook beneath his curving bank doth go


s: Where many boughs the still pool overlean


s: And many leaves make shadow with their sheen.


s: A velvet flute-note fell down pleasantly


s: Had fluttered down upon that pool of tone


s: The solemn spaces where the shadows bide.


s: From the warm concave of that fluted note


s: Somewhat, half song, half odor, forth did float,


s: Breathes through life's strident polyphone


s: Than man's mere thought e'er comprehends


s: I speak for all-shaped blooms and leaves,


s: Grasses and grains in ranks and sheaves;


s: Broad-fronded ferns and keen-leaved canes,


s: And marsh-plants, thirsty-cupped for rains,


s: That fly from tree-trunks and bark-rings;


s: All tree-sounds, rustlings of pine-cones,


s: Vale-calms and tranquil lotos-sleeps; --


s: Yea, all fair forms, and sounds, and lights,


s: I heard, when `ALL FOR LOVE' the violins cried:


s: So, Nature calls through all her system wide,


s: `Give me thy love, O man, so long denied.'


s: Much time is run, and man hath changed his ways,


s: Since Nature, in the antique fable-days,


s: Was hid from man's true love by proxy fays,


s: False fauns and rascal gods that stole her praise.


s: The nymphs, cold creatures of man's colder brain,


s: Chilled Nature's streams till man's warm heart was fain


s: Later, a sweet Voice `Love thy neighbor' said;


s: Then first the bounds of neighborhood outspread


s: Beyond all confines of old ethnic dread.


s: `ALL MEN ARE NEIGHBORS,' so the sweet Voice said.


s: So, when man's arms had circled all man's race,


s: Stretched bigger yet in the dark bounds of space;


s: With hands a-grope he felt smooth Nature's grace,


s: Drew her to breast and kissed her sweetheart face:


s: Yea man found neighbors in great hills and trees


s: And streams and clouds and suns and birds and bees,


s: And throbbed with neighbor-loves in loving these.


s: Thou Trade! thou king of the modern days!


s: I'm all for heart," the flute-voice said,


s: O cheeks coin-spotted with smirch and stain!


s: O trafficked hearts that break in twain!


s: -- And yet what wonder at my sisters' crime?


s: So hath Trade withered up Love's sinewy prime,


s: Deem men their life an opal gray, where plays


s: The one red Sweet of gracious ladies'-praise.


s: Now, comes a suitor with sharp prying eye --


s: Says, `Here, you Lady, if you'll sell I'll buy:


s: Come, heart for heart -- a trade?  What! weeping? why?'


s: In humble manliness should cry, `O sweet!


s: I know not if thy heart my heart will greet:


s: Whate'er thy worshipful soft tongue shall say,


s: I'll kiss thine answer, be it yea or nay:


s: Woe him that cunning trades in hearts contrives!


s: Base love good women to base loving drives.


s: If men loved larger, larger were our lives;


s: And wooed they nobler, won they nobler wives."


s: There thrust the bold straightforward horn


s: And man shall sing thee a true-love song,


s: Will Truth's long blade ne'er gleam again?


s: And place be hugged for the sake of gold,


s: Where much for little, and all for part,


s: Shall Trade aye salve his conscience-aches


s: With jibes at Chivalry's old mistakes --


s: Now by each knight that e'er hath prayed


s: To fight like a man and love like a maid,


s: Since Pembroke's life, as Pembroke's blade,


s: Nor time hath changed His hair to white,


s: I doubt no doubts:  I strive, and shrive my clay,


s: And fight my fight in the patient modern way


s: For true love and for thee -- ah me! and pray


s: Made end that knightly horn, and spurred away


s: Then o'er sea-lashings of commingling tunes


s: Old harpers sitting on the high sea-dunes,


s: "Life! Life! thou sea-fugue, writ from east to west,


s: To follow Time's dying melodies through,


s: And ever Love hears the poor-folks' crying,


s: And ever Love hears the women's sighing,


s: And ever sweet knighthood's death-defying,


s: And ever wise childhood's deep implying,


s: Though long deferred, though long deferred:


s: O'er the modern waste a dove hath whirred:


s: of its two themes, -- the evils of the trade-spirit


s: but which is a revelation from God of justice, of fair dealing,


s: though I conceal it under the form of a pure novel."


s: in purpose and in spirit.  All three voice the outcry of the poor


s: which almost lulls one to sleep, and `The Odyssey' ix. 80-104.


s: `Lady Clarinda's Song' (Gosse's `English Lyrics').


s: `Love Is Enough'; `Aurora Leigh', Book ix.:


s: O Art, my Art, thou'rt much, but Love is more!


s: and Langland's `Piers the Plowman' (ed. by Skeat, i. 202-3):


s: "Love is leche of lyf and nexte oure Lorde selve,


s: And also the graith gate that goth into hevene."*


s: It 'pear to me dis mornin' I kin smell de fust o' June.


s: I 'clar', I b'lieve dat mockin'-bird could play de fiddle soon!


s: Dem yonder town-bells sounds like dey was ringin' in de moon.


s: I know my front ones IS stopped up, and things is sort o' dim,


s: And as for Hebben, -- bless de Lord, and praise His holy name --


s: DAT shines in all de co'ners of dis cabin jes' de same


s: As ef dat cabin hadn't nar' a plank upon de frame!


s: Who CALL me?  Listen down de ribber, Dinah!  Don't you hyar


s: Somebody holl'in' "HOO, JIM, HOO?"  My Sarah died las' y'ar;


s: IS dat black angel done come back to call ole Jim f'om hyar?


s: My stars, dat cain't be Sarah, shuh!  Jes' listen, Dinah, NOW!


s: What KIN be comin' up dat bend, a-makin' sich a row?


s: A-splashin' up de water wid his tail and wid his hoof!


s: I'se pow'ful skeered; but neversomeless I ain't gwine run away:


s: I'm gwine to stand stiff-legged for de Lord dis blessed day.


s: YOU screech, and swish de water, Satan!  I'se a gwine to pray.


s: O hebbenly Marster, what thou willest, dat mus' be jes' so,


s: Den, Lord, please take ole Jim, and lef young Dinah hyar below!


s: But dis ole traveller's feet been tired dis many a many a mile.


s: I'se wufless as de rotten pole of las' year's fodder-stack.


s: De rheumatiz done bit my bones; you hear 'em crack and crack?


s: I cain'st sit down 'dout gruntin' like 'twas breakin' o' my back.


s: But, Dinah!  Shuh dat gal jes' like dis little hick'ry tree,


s: I would not proud persume -- but I'll boldly make reques';


s: Sence Jacob had dat wrastlin'-match, I, too, gwine do my bes';


s: When Jacob got all underholt, de Lord he answered Yes!


s: And what for waste de vittles, now, and th'ow away de bread,


s: Stop; -- ef I don't believe de Debble's gone on up de stream!


s: O glory hallelujah to de Lord dat reigns on high!


s: De Debble's fai'ly skeered to def, he done gone flyin' by;


s: I know'd he couldn't stand dat pra'r, I felt my Marster nigh!


s: You, Dinah; ain't you 'shamed, now, dat you didn' trust to grace?


s: You fool, you think de Debble couldn't beat YOU in a race?


s: I tell you, Dinah, jes' as shuh as you is standin' dar,


s: When folks starts prayin', answer-angels drops down th'u' de a'r.


s: In the third chapter of `The Gilded Age' (Hartford, Conn., 1873)


s: by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner, there is a piece,


s: "All crowded close together and every heart beat faster.


s: Uncle Dan'l pointed down the river with his bony finger.


s: a fierce eye of fire shot out from behind the cape and sent


s: till its long sides began to glow with spots of light


s: which mirrored themselves in the river and attended the monster


s: "`What is it?  Oh! what is it, Uncle Dan'l?'


s: "`It's de Almighty!  Git down on yo' knees!'


s: we ain't ready -- let dese po' chil'en hab one mo' chance,


s: "The flaming and churning steamer was right abreast the party,


s: and not twenty steps away.  The awful thunder of a mud-valve


s: suddenly burst forth, drowning the prayer, and as suddenly


s: "There was a moment of throbbing suspense, and then,


s: to the surprise and comfort of the party, it was plain


s: diminished by degrees and presently ceased altogether.


s: There follows a discussion as to whether or not the prayer caused


s: I wrote the authors of `The Gilded Age' and asked the source


s: without either history or tradition back of it.


s: A comparison of the two stories shows some differences.


s: at the end of the Magazine.  I wrote thee what Dr. Holland said


s: anent its resemblance to something of Mark Twain's in plot.


s: for a year and a half, and in May, 1862, joined his brother


s: in the Confederate Army.  His soldier life has been detailed


s: was wrecked in December, 1864.  He escaped, however,


s: `Biding Tryst' (1894), prose; `Greatest of These is Love',


s: the Chautauquans of 1898 have named themselves "The Laniers"


s: "The humblest life that lives may be divine."


s: All clean, and large, and calm with velvet rest?


s: That songs from me as leaves from thee may fly,


s: There breathe the meditations of thine art


s: Pure-born from these most rich and yet most white


s: That virginal-prayerful art shall be thy breath,


s: Rose-morals in English literature probably begin with


s: Sir John Mandeville in the fourteenth century.  At any rate,


s: and so was the mayden saved through the grace of God."


s: Thomas Carew has several rose-moralities, as `The True Beauty',


s: beginning "He that loves a rosy cheek," and his exquisite


s: Oh! let your smiles but clear the weather,


s: And then they both shall grow together."*


s: Some word whose worth my love's devoir might pay


s: `Learn from the rhyme that now shall come to thee


s: For, as a rhyme unto its rhyme-twin goes,


s: This poem was sent to Mrs. Gibson Peacock, of Philadelphia,


s: "My Lady's presence makes the Roses red,


s: Because to see her lips they blush for shame."


s: These flowers, as in their causes, sleep."


s: Since when it grows and smells, I swear,


s: Browning's `Women and Roses' should also be mentioned,


s: SOLO. --  Sin's rooster's crowed, Ole Mahster's riz,


s: CHORUS. --       Dey's mightily in de grass, grass,


s: De Meth'dis team's done hitched; O fool,


s: Whoop, look, jes' look at de Baptis' row,


s: De jay-bird squeal to de mockin'-bird:  "Stop!


s: Better sing one song for de Baptis' crop,


s: And de ole crow croak:  "Don' work, no, no;"


s: An' I spec' you mighty glad, you debblish crow,


s: Lord, thunder us up to de plowin'-match,


s: Yea, Lord, hab mussy on de Baptis' patch,


s: Notes:  Uncle Jim's Baptist Revival Hymn


s: not infrequently constructs from his daily surroundings.


s: "In addition to these exegetical commentaries the Northern reader


s: He summ'd the woods in song; or typic drew


s: The watch of hungry hawks, the lone dismay


s: Of languid doves when long their lovers stray,


s: And all birds' passion-plays that sprinkle dew


s: What e'er birds did or dreamed, this bird could say.


s: The sward, twitched in a grasshopper, made song


s: Midflight, perched, prinked, and to his art again.


s: Sweet Science, this large riddle read me plain:


s: How may the death of that dull insect be


s: The life of yon trim Shakspere on the tree?


s: In his `Birds and Poets' (Boston, 1877), Mr. John Burroughs says


s: But since the appearance of his book many poems have been written


s: Indeed, several noteworthy poems had been published


s: before the appearance of Mr. Burroughs's essay, as will appear


s: from the list below.  In a search of two days I found


s: Roughly speaking, the poems may be divided into two classes --


s: first those that, as in the Indian legend cited below,


s: But the latter view is espoused by most of the writers mentioned,


s: Mine is the voice of the young and strong,


s: It will be interesting and instructive to compare the tributes


s: to the mocking-bird with Keats's `Ode to a Nightingale',


s: Shelley's `To a Skylark', and Wordsworth's `To the Skylark'.


s: Aside from Audubon's `Birds of America' and Ridgway's


s: Meek, to Petrarch; Lanier, to Keats, in `To Our Mocking-bird',


s: The ferns and the fondling grass said `Stay,'


s: And the little reeds sighed `Abide, abide,


s: The chestnut, the oak, the walnut, the pine,


s: Overleaning, with flickering meaning and sign,


s: Said, `Pass not, so cold, these manifold


s: The white quartz shone, and the smooth brook-stone


s: Did bar me of passage with friendly brawl,


s: Made lures with the lights of streaming stone


s: In the clefts of the hills of Habersham,


s: Avail:  I am fain for to water the plain.


s: Downward, to toil and be mixed with the main,


s: The dry fields burn, and the mills are to turn,


s: And the lordly main from beyond the plain


s: at the southwestern extremity of Georgia.  The Chattahoochee


s: in which he speaks of "the sandy Chattahoochee".


s: The effect of the whole is musical beyond description.


s: It sings itself and yet nowhere sacrifices the thought" (Kent).


s: Another way to test the beauty of `The Song of the Chattahoochee'


s: Then Nan got a-tremble at nostril; she was the daintiest doe;


s: In the print of her velvet flank on the velvet fern


s: She reared, and rounded her ears in turn.


s: The hounds swept after with never a sound,


s: But Alan loud winded his horn in sign that the quarry was nigh.


s: For to drive him the deer to the lower glen-grounds:


s: Cried Maclean -- "if the deer seek to cross to the burn,


s: Was white in the face when the ten-tined buck and the does


s: "Now, now, grim henchman, what is't with thee?"


s: I had killed if the gluttonous kern had not wrought me


s: "Ten blows, for ten tine, on his back let fall,


s: If a slimmer-paunched henchman will hurry with me,


s: But look! red Hamish has risen; quick about and about turns he.


s: Not a breath's time for asking; an eye-glance reveals


s: And the lady cries:  "Clansmen, run for a fee! --


s: Ten blows on Maclean's bare back shall fall,


s: Let me hurl off the damnable hound in the sea!"


s: Could ye cure me my heart with the death of a knave?


s: Till her finger nigh felt of the bairnie's face --


s: And gazed hungrily o'er, and the blood from his back


s: And the mother stared white on the waste of blue,


s: For an appreciation of this fine poem see `Introduction',


s: In chapter iii. Macleod, of Castle Dare, Mull, tells the story


s: to his London entertainer; but, as the story of the novel


s: is identical with that of the poem, it need not be given here.


s: The novel, I should add, gives the name of the chieftain only,


s: is identical with Lanier's poem, except that the former begins


s: with the speech of the flogged henchman, here named Evan,


s: were the Macleans of Dowart and the Macleans of Lochbuy,


s: Clamber the forks of the multiform boughs, --


s: Wrought of the leaves to allure to the whisper of vows,


s: When lovers pace timidly down through the green colonnades


s: Of the dim sweet woods, of the dear dark woods,


s: That run to the radiant marginal sand-beach within


s: Beautiful glooms, soft dusks in the noon-day fire, --


s: Wildwood privacies, closets of lone desire,


s: Chamber from chamber parted with wavering arras of leaves, --


s: Cool for the dutiful weighing of ill with good; --


s: O braided dusks of the oak and woven shades of the vine,


s: While the riotous noon-day sun of the June-day long did shine


s: Ye held me fast in your heart and I held you fast in mine;


s: And the slant yellow beam down the wood-aisle doth seem


s: Like a lane into heaven that leads from a dream, --


s: Ay, now, when my soul all day hath drunken the soul of the oak,


s: And belief overmasters doubt, and I know that I know,


s: And my spirit is grown to a lordly great compass within,


s: Drew over me out of the merciless miles of the plain, --


s: To the edge of the wood I am drawn, I am drawn,


s: Where the gray beach glimmering runs, as a belt of the dawn,


s: Thus -- with your favor -- soft, with a reverent hand,


s: (Not lightly touching your person, Lord of the land!)


s: Bending your beauty aside, with a step I stand


s: By a world of marsh that borders a world of sea.


s: Sinuous southward and sinuous northward the shimmering band


s: Vanishing, swerving, evermore curving again into sight,


s: Softly the sand-beach wavers away to a dim gray looping of light.


s: From the weighing of fate and the sad discussion of sin,


s: Ye spread and span like the catholic man who hath mightily won


s: God out of knowledge and good out of infinite pain


s: And sight out of blindness and purity out of a stain.


s: I will fly in the greatness of God as the marsh-hen flies


s: I will heartily lay me a-hold on the greatness of God:


s: Oh, like to the greatness of God is the greatness within


s: The range of the marshes, the liberal marshes of Glynn.


s: That like as with rosy and silvery essences flow


s: The creeks overflow:  a thousand rivulets run


s: Passeth, and all is still; and the currents cease to run;


s: And now from the Vast of the Lord will the waters of sleep


s: "The Marshes of Glynn" had not yet achieved its later prominence


s: that there is something so individual and original about it,


s: Whitman's virile imagination and Emerson's high spirituality


s: it is the best expression of his genius and one of the few


s: "The background of the poem -- as of `Sunrise' -- is the forest,


s: the coast and the marshes near Brunswick, Georgia.  Early in life


s: Prim Creed, with categoric point, forbear


s: Thou canst not measure Mistress Nature's hair,


s: Not one sweet inch:  nay, if thy sight is sharp,


s: Would'st count the strings upon an angel's harp?


s: Than there is line to sound with:  let me love


s: My fellow not as men that mandates keep:


s: That let me love by heart, by heart, because


s: (Free from the penal pressure of the laws)


s: The tears I weep by day and bitter night,


s: Opinion! for thy sole salt vintage fall.


s: -- As morn by morn I rise with fresh delight,


s: Time through my casement cheerily doth call,


s: "Nature is new, 'tis birthday every day,


s: Come feast with me, let no man say me nay,


s: Some brother bright:  but, ere good-morrow's passed,


s: "Thou shalt not sit by us, to break thy fast,


s: Save to our Rubric thou subscribe and swear --


s: `Religion hath blue eyes and yellow hair':


s: Then, hard a-hungered for my brother's grace


s: Till well-nigh fain to swear his folly's true,


s: To him that sits on the left:  "Brother, -- with you?"


s: -- "Nay, not with me, save thou subscribe and swear


s: `Religion hath black eyes and raven hair':


s: Debarred of banquets that my heart could make


s: I homeward turn, my fires of pain to slake


s: In deep endearments of a worshiped wife.


s: "I love thee well, dear Love," quoth she, "and yet


s: Would that thy creed with mine completely met,


s: Assassin! Thief! Opinion, 'tis thy work.


s: By Church, by throne, by hearth, by every good


s: That's in the Town of Time, I see thee lurk,


s: And e'er some shadow stays where thou hast stood.


s: Thou hand'st sweet Socrates his hemlock sour;


s: Thou sav'st Barabbas in that hideous hour,


s: Deliverer Christ; thou rack'st the souls of men;


s: Thou tossest girls to lions and boys to flames;


s: Thou buildest closets full of secret shames;


s: Indifferent cruel, thou dost blow the blaze


s: -- Thou base-born Accident of time and place --


s: Bigot Pretender unto Judgment's throne --


s: Those rights the true, true Son of Man doth own


s: At head of civil wars and quarrels old --


s: I would thou left'st me free, to live with love,


s: And faith, that through the love of love doth find


s: My Lord's dear presence in the stars above,


s: The clods below, the flesh without, the mind


s: Opinion, damned Intriguer, gray with guile,


s: This is the first and the greatest of the `Street-cries':


s: see the introductory note to `Life and Song'.


s: on October 16, 1555, see Green's `Shorter History of England'.


s: Michael Servetus, a Spanish scientific and theological writer,


s: was burned as a heretic at Geneva, October 27, 1553.


s: With dreams, and with the heavenly Muse.


s: let us carry with us the strains of this poem, which interprets


s: Oh wait, oh wait, in the warm red West, --


s: O cloud in the West, like a thought in the heart


s: Bring hither my brother Antonio, -- Man, --


s: But the olives they were not blind to Him,


s: The little gray leaves were kind to Him:


s: When Death and Shame would woo Him last,


s: From under the trees they drew Him last:


s: of trees and plant-life; and, after quoting some lines


s: on the soothing and inspiring companionship of trees,


s: But to many others this short poem will express most wonderfully


s: For Lanier's other poems on Christ see `Introduction',


s: The little green leaves would not let me alone in my sleep;


s: Up-breathed from the marshes, a message of range and of sweep,


s: Interwoven with waftures of wild sea-liberties, drifting,


s: Came through the lapped leaves sifting, sifting,


s: Then my thoughts, in the dark of the dungeon-keep


s: Upstarted, by twos and by threes assembling:


s: I have waked, I have come, my beloved!  I might not abide:


s: I have come ere the dawn, O beloved, my live-oaks, to hide


s: As a lover in heaven, the marsh my marsh and the sea my sea.


s: Tell me, sweet burly-bark'd, man-bodied Tree


s: That mine arms in the dark are embracing, dost know


s: Betwixt dear over-beautiful trees and the rain of the eyes?


s: O cunning green leaves, little masters! like as ye gloss


s: All the dull-tissued dark with your luminous darks that emboss


s: The vague blackness of night into pattern and plan,


s: (But would I could know, but would I could know,)


s: While his cry to the dead for some knowledge is under the ban,


s: Designs on the night of our knowledge, -- yea, ye have taught me,


s: That haply we know somewhat more than we know.


s: Ye lispers, whisperers, singers in storms,


s: Ye consciences murmuring faiths under forms,


s: Oh, rain me down from your darks that contain me


s: Wisdoms ye winnow from winds that pain me, --


s: That advise me of more than they bring, -- repeat


s: Me the woods-smell that swiftly but now brought breath


s: From the heaven-side bank of the river of death, --


s: Teach me the terms of silence, -- preach me


s: The passion of patience, -- sift me, -- impeach me, --


s: As ye hang with your myriad palms upturned in the air,


s: That out of the leaves of the low-hanging bough,


s: Reverend Marsh, low-couched along the sea,


s: Hast found it:  for this silence, filling now


s: This solves us all:  man, matter, doubt, disgrace,


s: Too clear!  That crystal nothing who'll peruse?


s: The blackest night could bring us brighter news.


s: With trying to breathe no bigger than thy race


s: Just to be fellow'd, when that thou hast found


s: No man with room, or grace enough of bound


s: To entertain that New thou tell'st, thou art, --


s: 'Tis here, 'tis here thou canst unhand thy heart


s: And breathe it free, and breathe it free,


s: The tide's at full:  the marsh with flooded streams


s: The marsh brags ten:  looped on his breast they lie.


s: To this bow-and-string tension of beauty and silence a-spring, --


s: Over-weighted with stars, over-freighted with light,


s: Over-sated with beauty and silence, will seem


s: If a bound of degree to this grace be laid,


s: But no:  it is made:  list! somewhere, -- mystery, where?


s: Upwinds through the woods; the little ones, softly conferring,


s: Have settled my lord's to be looked for; so; they are still;


s: But the air and my heart and the earth are a-thrill, --


s: Of the marsh-grass in serial shimmers and shades, --


s: And invisible wings, fast fleeting, fast fleeting,


s: The dark overhead as my heart beats, -- and steady and free


s: Is the ebb-tide flowing from marsh to sea --


s: With your lapfuls of stars and dreams), --


s: For list, down the inshore curve of the creek


s: And lo, in the East!  Will the East unveil?


s: The East is unveiled, the East hath confessed


s: Now a dream of a flame through that dream of a flush is uprolled:


s: Is builded, in shape as a bee-hive, from out of the sea:


s: The hive is of gold undazzling, but oh, the Bee,


s: That shall flash from the hive-hole over the sea.


s: Ere with the sun their souls exhale away.


s: Now in each pettiest personal sphere of dew


s: The summ'd morn shines complete as in the blue


s: Big dew-drop of all heaven:  with these lit shrines


s: O'er-silvered to the farthest sea-confines,


s: Of worship lies.  Peace to the ante-reign


s: Not slower than Majesty moves, for a mean and a measure


s: Of motion, -- not faster than dateless Olympian leisure


s: Forever revealing, revealing, revealing,


s: Edgewise, bladewise, halfwise, wholewise, -- 'tis done!


s: With several voice, with ascription one,


s: The woods and the marsh and the sea and my soul


s: O Artisan born in the purple, -- Workman Heat, --


s: Parter of passionate atoms that travail to meet


s: And be mixed in the death-cold oneness, -- innermost Guest


s: At the marriage of elements, -- fellow of publicans, -- blest


s: King in the blouse of flame, that loiterest o'er


s: The idle skies yet laborest fast evermore, --


s: Thou, in the fine forge-thunder, thou, in the beat


s: Of the heart of a man, thou Motive, -- Laborer Heat:


s: Pearl-glint, shell-tint, ancientest perfectest hues


s: Ever shaming the maidens, -- lily and rose


s: Confess thee, and each mild flame that glows


s: In the clarified virginal bosoms of stones that shine,


s: Thou chemist of storms, whether driving the winds a-swirl


s: Or a-flicker the subtiler essences polar that whirl


s: In the magnet earth, -- yea, thou with a storm for a heart,


s: Yet ever the artist, ever more large and bright


s: Than the eye of a man may avail of: --  manifold One,


s: I must pass from thy face, I must pass from the face of the Sun:


s: Old Want is awake and agog, every wrinkle a-frown;


s: The worker must pass to his work in the terrible town:


s: But I fear not, nay, and I fear not the thing to be done;


s: I am strong with the strength of my lord the Sun:


s: How dark, how dark soever the race that must needs be run,


s: Never the hell-colored smoke of the factories


s: Never the reek of the time's fen-politics


s: Labor, at leisure, in art, -- till yonder beside thee


s: and the hand which first pencilled its lines had not strength


s: Aside from the numerous unapproachable snatches in Shakespeare,*


s: I know of nothing on the subject in English literature


s: comparable to `Sunrise'.  Mr. W. W. Story's `Sunrise' is perhaps


s: the closest parallel, and yet it is far inferior to Lanier's,


s: as every reader of the two will admit.  If one wishes to make


s: * Among others I may cite the following passages:


s: "Hark! hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings,"


s: "But look the morn in russet mantle clad


s: Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastern hill,"


s: "Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day


s: Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain-tops,"


s: "Full many a glorious morning have I seen" etc.,


s: with this feeling of brotherhood for all created things."


s: "While heart's blood ebbed at every breath


s: He passed life's head-land bleak and dun,


s: Florida:  Its Scenery, Climate, and History.  12mo, pp. 336.


s: The Science of English Verse.  Crown 8vo, pp. xv, 315.


s: Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1880.


s: The Boy's Percy.  Being Old Ballads of War, Adventure, and Love,


s: from Bishop Thomas Percy's Reliques of Ancient English Poetry.


s: Poems of Sidney Lanier, Edited by his Wife, with a Memorial


s: by William Hayes Ward.  New York:  Charles Scribner's Sons, 1884,


s: `Macon Daily Telegraph' of April 27, 1870, and reprinted in same


s: Review of Hayne's Poems:  `Southern Magazine', 1874.


s: Criticism of Rubinstein's Ocean Symphony:  `The Sun' (Baltimore),


s: Letter to Mr. J. F. D. Lanier, a banker of New York,


s: Two Letters to Bayard Taylor:  Taylor (M. H.) and Scudder's


s: The Legend of St. Leonor, a Fragment from an Unfinished Lecture


s: The Happy Soul's Address to the Dead Body, from Shakespeare


s: A Great Man Wanted, Extract from Letter of November 15, 1874,


s: What I Know about Flowers, a S. S. address delivered about 1868,


s: Letters to Mr. and Mrs. Gibson Peacock, from January 26, 1875,


s: Songs Against Death (five stanzas, the last fragmentary):


s: To "The White Flower" of The English Novel, written in 1878,


s: The Lord's Romance of Time, an Outline:  `Sunday-school Times'


s: an extract from `The Symphony', and `The Crystal'.


s: * Unless the title of the criticism is given, the article treats


s: Lanier's life and works in general.  Except in special cases


s: Blackman, O.:  see `Lawrence' under `V'.


s: Buck, Dudley:  Music to Lanier's `Centennial Cantata'.


s: Buck, Dudley:  `Sunset', music to Lanier's `Evening Song'.


s: Burton, Richard E.:  `Lanier Bibliography', in Gilman's


s: Coleman, C. W., Jr.:  `Homes of Some Southern Authors IV.',


s: Kent, C. W.:  `A Study of Lanier's Poems, in Publications of


s: Newell, A. C.:  `Lanier's Life at Oglethorpe College',


s: Spann, Minnie:  `Sidney Lanier's Youth, S. L.'s Manhood',


s: Taylor (M. H.) and Scudder's `Life and Letters of Bayard Taylor',


s: Thayer, W. R. (ed.):  `Letters of Sidney Lanier' [to Mr. and Mrs.


s: Wilson (J. G.) and Fiske (J.), eds.:  `Appleton's Cyclopaedia


s: Burton, Richard E.:  Gilman's `Memorial', p. 12.


s: Lanier, Clifford:  `Acknowledgment, To all who love S. L.',


s: Nega ai mortali e nega a' morti il fato.


s: Lo, thus, as prostrate, "In the dust I write


s: My heart's deep languor and my soul's sad tears."


s: Yet why evoke the spectres of black night


s: Why disinter dead faith from mouldering hidden?


s: Why break the seals of mute despair unbidden,


s: And wail life's discords into careless ears?


s: Because a cold rage seizes one at whiles


s: To show the bitter old and wrinkled truth


s: Stripped naked of all vesture that beguiles,


s: False dreams, false hopes, false masks and modes of youth;


s: Because it gives some sense of power and passion


s: Our woe in living words howe'er uncouth.


s: Surely I write not for the hopeful young,


s: Or those who deem their happiness of worth,


s: The shows of life and feel nor doubt nor dearth,


s: For none of these I write, and none of these


s: Could read the writing if they deigned to try;


s: So may they flourish in their due degrees,


s: On our sweet earth and in their unplaced sky.


s: If any cares for the weak words here written,


s: It must be some one desolate, Fate-smitten,


s: Whose faith and hopes are dead, and who would die.


s: Will understand the speech and feel a stir


s: Uplifts his voice to let me know a brother


s: Travels the same wild paths though out of sight."


s: Your dolorous mysteries shrouded from of yore?


s: Will comprehend the language of the message,


s: The City is of Night; perchance of Death


s: Can come the lucid morning's fragrant breath


s: The moon and stars may shine with scorn or pity


s: Though present in distempered gloom of thought


s: But when a dream night after night is brought


s: Throughout a week, and such weeks few or many


s: Recur each year for several years, can any


s: Discern that dream from real life in aught?


s: For life is but a dream whose shapes return,


s: Some frequently, some seldom, some by night


s: And some by day, some night and day: we learn,


s: The while all change and many vanish quite,


s: In their recurrence with recurrent changes


s: A certain seeming order; where this ranges


s: We count things real; such is memory's might.


s: The main north channel of a broad lagoon,


s: Regurging with the salt tides from the mouth;


s: Waste marshes shine and glister to the moon


s: For leagues, then moorland black, then stony ridges;


s: Great piers and causeways, many noble bridges,


s: Connect the town and islet suburbs strewn.


s: And scarcely overlaps the long curved crest


s: Which swells out two leagues from the river marge.


s: A trackless wilderness rolls north and west,


s: Savannahs, savage woods, enormous mountains,


s: Bleak uplands, black ravines with torrent fountains;


s: And eastward rolls the shipless sea's unrest.


s: More sad, are found within its precincts vast.


s: The street-lamps always burn; but scarce a casement


s: In house or palace front from roof to basement


s: Doth glow or gleam athwart the mirk air cast.


s: The street-lamps burn amid the baleful glooms,


s: Of ranged mansions dark and still as tombs.


s: The silence which benumbs or strains the sense


s: Fulfils with awe the soul's despair unweeping:


s: Or dead, or fled from nameless pestilence!


s: Perchance one mourner to a thousand dead,


s: So there: worn faces that look deaf and blind


s: Like tragic masks of stone.  With weary tread,


s: Each wrapt in his own doom, they wander, wander,


s: Through sleepless hours with heavy drooping head.


s: Mature men chiefly, few in age or youth,


s: A child!  If here the heart turns sick with ruth


s: Or lame or blind, as preordained to languish


s: Through youthless life, think how it bleeds with anguish


s: To meet one erring in that homeless wild.


s: They often murmur to themselves, they speak


s: Broods maddening inwardly and scorns to wreak


s: To frenzy which must rave, none heeds the clamour,


s: Unless there waits some victim of like glamour,


s: To rave in turn, who lends attentive show.


s: There sweet sleep is not for the weary brain;


s: The pitiless hours like years and ages creep,


s: A night seems termless hell.  This dreadful strain


s: Of thought and consciousness which never ceases,


s: Or which some moments' stupor but increases,


s: They leave all hope behind who enter there:


s: One certitude while sane they cannot leave,


s: The certitude of Death, which no reprieve


s: Can put off long; and which, divinely tender,


s: But waits the outstretched hand to promptly render


s: That draught whose slumber nothing can bereave (1)


s: (1) Though the Garden of thy Life be wholly waste, the sweet


s: flowers withered, the fruit-trees barren, over its wall hang


s: ever the rich dark clusters of the Vine of Death, within


s: easy reach of thy hand, which may pluck of them when it


s: Because he seemed to walk with an intent


s: I followed him; who, shadowlike and frail,


s: Regardless, wrapt in thought as in a veil:


s: Thus step for step with lonely sounding feet


s: We travelled many a long dim silent street.


s: At length he paused: a black mass in the gloom,


s: Around, the huddled stones of grave and tomb:


s: Some old God's-acre now corruption's sty:


s: He murmured to himself with dull despair,


s: Here Faith died, poisoned by this charnel air.


s: Then turning to the right went on once more


s: And travelled weary roads without suspense;


s: And reached at last a low wall's open door,


s: Whose villa gleamed beyond the foliage dense:


s: He gazed, and muttered with a hard despair,


s: Here Love died, stabbed by its own worshipped pair.


s: Then turning to the right resumed his march,


s: And travelled street and lanes with wondrous strength,


s: We stood before a squalid house at length:


s: He gazed, and whispered with a cold despair,


s: Here Hope died, starved out in its utmost lair.


s: When he had spoken thus, before he stirred,


s: I spoke, perplexed by something in the signs


s: In this drear pilgrimage to ruined shrines:


s: Where Faith and Love and Hope are dead indeed,


s: Can Life still live?  By what doth it proceed?


s: As whom his one intense thought overpowers,


s: The signs and figures of the circling hours,


s: The works proceed until run down; although


s: Bereft of purpose, void of use, still go.


s: Then turning to the right paced on again,


s: And traversed squares and travelled streets whose glooms


s: Seemed more and more familiar to my ken;


s: And reached that sullen temple of the tombs;


s: And paused to murmur with the old despair,


s: Hear Faith died, poisoned by this charnel air.


s: I ceased to follow, for the knot of doubt


s: The series of the fraction left of Life;


s: Of but three terms, dead Faith, dead Love, dead Hope. (1)


s: (1) Life divided by that persistent three = --- = .210.


s: Although lamps burn along the silent streets,


s: Even when moonlight silvers empty squares


s: The dark holds countless lanes and close retreats;


s: But when the night its sphereless mantle wears


s: The open spaces yawn with gloom abysmal,


s: The sombre mansions loom immense and dismal,


s: The lanes are black as subterranean lairs.


s: And soon the eye a strange new vision learns:


s: The night remains for it as dark and dense,


s: Yet clearly in this darkness it discerns


s: As in the daylight with its natural sense;


s: Perceives a shade in shadow not obscurely,


s: Pursues a stir of black in blackness surely,


s: Sees spectres also in the gloom intense.


s: The ear, too, with the silence vast and deep


s: Hears breathings as of hidden life asleep,


s: And muffled throbs as of pent passions wild,


s: Far murmurs, speech of pity or derision;


s: but all more dubious than the things of vision,


s: So that it knows not when it is beguiled.


s: No time abates the first despair and awe,


s: But wonder ceases soon; the weirdest thing


s: Is felt least strange beneath the lawless law


s: Where Death-in-Life is the eternal king;


s: Crushed impotent beneath this reign of terror,


s: He stood alone within the spacious square


s: Declaiming from the central grassy mound,


s: With head uncovered and with streaming hair,


s: As if large multitudes were gathered round:


s: A stalwart shape, the gestures full of might,


s: The glances burning with unnatural light:--


s: As I came through the desert thus it was,


s: As I came through the desert: All was black,


s: In heaven no single star, on earth no track;


s: The air so thick it clotted in my throat;


s: And thus for hours; then some enormous things


s: Swooped past with savage cries and clanking wings:


s: As I came through the desert: Eyes of fire


s: Glared at me throbbing with a starved desire;


s: The hoarse and heavy and carnivorous breath


s: Was hot upon me from deep jaws of death;


s: Sharp claws, swift talons, fleshless fingers cold


s: Plucked at me from the bushes, tried to hold:


s: As I came through the desert: Lo you, there,


s: That hillock burning with a brazen glare;


s: Those myriad dusky flames with points a-glow


s: Which writhed and hissed and darted to and fro;


s: A Sabbath of the Serpents, heaped pell-mell


s: For Devil's roll-call and some fete of Hell:


s: As I came through the desert thus it was,


s: As I came through the desert: Meteors ran


s: And crossed their javelins on the black sky-span;


s: The dreadful thunderbolts jarred earth's fixed frame;


s: The ground all heaved in waves of fire that surged


s: And weltered round me sole there unsubmerged:


s: As I came through the desert: Air once more,


s: The deep tide thundered up a league-broad strand;


s: White foambelts seethed there, wan spray swept and flew;


s: The sky broke, moon and stars and clouds and blue:


s: As I came through the desert: On the left


s: The sun arose and crowned a broad crag-cleft;


s: There stopped and burned out black, except a rim,


s: Whereon the moon fell suddenly south-west,


s: And stood above the right-hand cliffs at rest:


s: As I came through the desert: From the right


s: Bareheaded and barefooted on that strand;


s: As I came through the desert thus it was,


s: As I came through the desert: I was twain,


s: Two selves distinct that cannot join again;


s: One stood apart and knew but could not stir,


s: And watched the other stark in swoon and her;


s: And she came on, and never turned aside,


s: Between such sun and moon and roaring tide:


s: As I came through the desert: Hell is mild


s: And piteous matched with that accursed wild;


s: A large black sign was on her breast that bowed,


s: A broad black band ran down her snow-white shroud;


s: That lamp she held was her own burning heart,


s: Whose blood-drops trickled step by step apart:


s: As I came through the desert: By the sea


s: She knelt and bent above that senseless me;


s: Those lamp-drops fell upon my white brow there,


s: She tried to cleanse them with her tears and hair;


s: She murmured words of pity, love, and woe,


s: As I came through the desert thus it was,


s: As I came through the desert: When the tide


s: Swept up to her there kneeling by my side,


s: She clasped that corpse-like me, and they were borne


s: Away, and this vile me was left forlorn;


s: I know the whole sea cannot quench that heart,


s: Or cleanse that brow, or wash those two apart:


s: How he arrives there none can clearly know;


s: Athwart the mountains and immense wild tracts,


s: Or flung a waif upon that vast sea-flow,


s: To leave it, slow faint birth intense pangs quicken;


s: And memory swoons in both the tragic acts.


s: Escape seems hopeless to the heart forlorn:


s: Can Death-in-Life be brought to life again?


s: And yet release does come; there comes a morn


s: When he awakes from slumbering so sweetly


s: That all the world is changed for him completely,


s: He scarcely can believe the blissful change,


s: He weeps perchance who wept not while accurst;


s: Poor wretch!  who once hath paced that dolent city


s: Shall pace it often, doomed beyond all pity,


s: With horror ever deepening from the first.


s: Though he possess sweet babes and loving wife,


s: A home of peace by loyal friendships cheered,


s: And love them more than death or happy life,


s: They shall avail not; he must dree his weird;


s: Renounce all blessings for that imprecation,


s: Steal forth and haunt that builded desolation,


s: Of woe and terrors and thick darkness reared.


s: And watched the bridge-lamps glow like golden stars


s: Above the blackness of the swelling tide,


s: Down which they struck rough gold in ruddier bars;


s: And heard the heave and plashing of the flow


s: Large elm-trees stood along that river-walk;


s: And under one, a few steps from my seat,


s: I heard strange voices join in stranger talk,


s: Although I had not heard approaching feet:


s: These bodiless voices in my waking dream


s: Flowed dark words blending with sombre stream:--


s: And you have after all come back; come back.


s: And you have failed: our spark of hope is black.


s: That I have failed is proved by my return:


s: The spark is quenched, nor ever more will burn,


s: But listen; and the story you shall learn.


s: I reached the portal common spirits fear,


s: And read the words above it, dark yet clear,


s: "Leave hope behind, all ye who enter here:"


s: And would have passed in, gratified to gain


s: A demon warder clutched me, Not so fast;


s: First leave your hopes behind!--But years have passed


s: Since I left all behind me, to the last:


s: You cannot count for hope, with all your wit,


s: This bleak despair that drives me to the Pit:


s: He snarled, What thing is this which apes a soul,


s: And would find entrance to our gulf of dole


s: Without the payment of the settled toll?


s: Outside the gate he showed an open chest:


s: Here pay their entrance fees the souls unblest;


s: Cast in some hope, you enter with the rest.


s: This is Pandora's box; whose lid shall shut,


s: And Hell-gate too, when hopes have filled it; but


s: They are so thin that it will never glut.


s: I stood a few steps backwards, desolate;


s: And watched the spirits pass me to their fate,


s: And fling off hope, and enter at the gate.


s: When one casts off a load he springs upright,


s: Squares back his shoulders, breathes will all his might,


s: And briskly paces forward strong and light:


s: But these, as if they took some burden, bowed;


s: The whole frame sank; however strong and proud


s: Before, they crept in quite infirm and cowed.


s: And as they passed me, earnestly from each


s: To pay my entrance; but all mocked my speech.


s: No one would cede a little of his store,


s: Though knowing that in instants three or four


s: Shut out alike from heaven and Earth and Hell.


s: The other sighed back, Yea; but if we grope


s: With care through all this Limbo's dreary scope,


s: We yet may pick up some minute lost hope;


s: And sharing it between us, entrance win,


s: In spite of fiends so jealous for gross sin:


s: Some say that phantoms haunt those shadowy streets,


s: And mingle freely there with sparse mankind;


s: And tell of ancient woes and black defeats,


s: And murmur mysteries in the grave enshrined:


s: But others think them visions of illusion,


s: Who bares his heart and tells of his own fall,


s: Reserves some inmost secret good or bad:


s: The nudity of flesh will blush though tameless


s: The extreme nudity of bone grins shameless,


s: The unsexed skeleton mocks shroud and pall.


s: I have seen phantoms there that were as men


s: And men that were as phantoms flit and roam;


s: Marked shapes that were not living to my ken,


s: Caught breathings acrid as with Dead Sea foam:


s: The City rests for man so weird and awful,


s: That his intrusion there might seem unlawful,


s: And phantoms there may have their proper home.


s: While I still lingered on that river-walk,


s: And watched the tide as black as our black doom,


s: And saw them to the left hand in the gloom


s: Seated against an elm bole on the ground,


s: Their eyes intent upon the stream profound.


s: But had some joy and solace in his life,


s: Some chance of triumph in the dreadful strife:


s: The various vessels large and small that float,


s: Ignoring every wrecked and sunken boat."


s: "And yet I asked no splendid dower, no spoil


s: But homely love with common food and health,


s: And nightly sleep to balance daily toil."


s: "This all-too-humble soul would arrogate


s: "Who is most wretched in this dolorous place?


s: Who formed such creatures to His own disgrace.


s: "The vilest thing must be less vile than Thou


s: From whom it had its being, God and Lord!


s: "That not for all Thy power furled and unfurled,


s: Of having made such men in such a world."


s: "As if a Being, God or Fiend, could reign,


s: As to produce men when He might refrain!


s: "The world rolls round for ever like a mill;


s: It grinds out death and life and good and ill;


s: It has no purpose, heart or mind or will.


s: "While air of Space and Time's full river flow


s: The mill must blindly whirl unresting so:


s: It may be wearing out, but who can know?


s: "Man might know one thing were his sight less dim;


s: That it whirls not to suit his petty whim,


s: "Nay, does it treat him harshly as he saith?


s: It grinds him some slow years of bitter breath,


s: Then grinds him back into eternal death."


s: It is full strange to him who hears and feels,


s: When wandering there in some deserted street,


s: The booming and the jar of ponderous wheels,


s: The trampling clash of heavy ironshod feet:


s: Who in this Venice of the Black Sea rideth?


s: To buy or sell as those in daylight sweet?


s: The rolling thunder seems to fill the sky


s: As it comes on; the horses snort and strain,


s: A man sits nodding on the shaft or trudges


s: Three parts asleep beside his fellow-drudges:


s: What merchandise?  whence, whither, and for whom?


s: Perchance it is a Fate-appointed hearse,


s: The joy, the peace, the life-hope, the abortions


s: Of all things good which should have been our portions,


s: But have been strangled by that City's curse.


s: The mansion stood apart in its own ground;


s: In front thereof a fragrant garden-lawn,


s: High trees about it, and the whole walled round:


s: The massy iron gates were both withdrawn;


s: And every window of its front shed light,


s: But though thus lighted it was deadly still


s: As all the countless bulks of solid gloom;


s: Permitting not a breath or chant of prayer?


s: Whereon lay still light from the open door;


s: The hall was noble, and its aspect awed,


s: Hung round with heavy black from dome to floor;


s: And ample stairways rose to left and right


s: Whose balustrades were also draped with night.


s: I paced from room to room, from hall to hall,


s: Nor any life throughout the maze discerned;


s: But each was hung with its funereal pall,


s: And held a shrine, around which tapers burned,


s: With picture or with statue or with bust,


s: all copied from the same fair form of dust:


s: Beloved by bounteous life and joy and youth,


s: And loving these sweet lovers, so that care


s: And age and death seemed not for her in sooth:


s: Alike as stars, all beautiful and bright,


s: these shapes lit up that mausolean night.


s: With heaviest blackness of the whole eclipse;


s: With tapers burning at the foot and head:


s: Deathstill, lifesweet, with folded palms she lay:


s: And kneeling there as at a sacred shrine


s: A young man wan and worn who seemed to pray:


s: Surmounted the large altar left in night:--


s: The chambers of the mansion of my heart,


s: In every one whereof thine image dwells,


s: Are black with grief eternal for thy sake.


s: Wherein thou ever dwellest quick or dead,


s: Is black with grief eternal for thy sake.


s: I kneel beside thee and I clasp the cross,


s: I kneel here patient as thou liest there;


s: While thou dost not awake I cannot move;


s: And something tells me thou wilt never wake,


s: Most beautiful were Death to end my grief,


s: Most hateful to destroy the sight of thee,


s: Dear vision better than all death or life.


s: But I renounce all choice of life or death,


s: And thus in bliss or woe be ever well.--


s: I glided with hushed footsteps from the place.


s: This was the festival that filled with light


s: What men are they who haunt these fatal glooms,


s: And fill their living mouths with dust of death,


s: And make their habitations in the tombs,


s: And breathe eternal sighs with mortal breath,


s: And pierce life's pleasant veil of various error


s: To reach that void of darkness and old terror


s: Wherein expire the lamps of hope and faith?


s: They have much wisdom yet they are not wise,


s: They have much goodness yet they do not well,


s: (The fools we know have their own paradise,


s: The wicked also have their proper Hell);


s: They have much strength but still their doom is stronger,


s: Much patience but their time endureth longer,


s: Much valour but life mocks it with some spell.


s: And outward madness not to be controlled;


s: Which has no power, but sitteth wan and cold,


s: And sees the madness, and foresees as plainly


s: And some are great in rank and wealth and power,


s: And some renowned for genius and for worth;


s: And some are poor and mean, who brood and cower


s: And shrink from notice, and accept all dearth


s: Of body, heart and soul, and leave to others


s: All boons of life: yet these and those are brothers,


s: The saddest and the weariest men on earth.


s: For one by one, each silent with his thought,


s: I marked a long loose line approach and wend


s: Athwart the great cathedral's cloistered square,


s: And in the porch a shrouded figure stood,


s: Who challenged each one pausing ere he passed,


s: With deep eyes burning through a blank white hood:


s: Whence come you in the world of life and light


s: For some scant justice to our countless hordes


s: Who toil half-starved with scarce a human right:


s: I wake from daydreams to this real night.


s: From wandering through many a solemn scene


s: From making hundreds laugh and roar with glee


s: From prayer and fasting in a lonely cell,


s: A nation which beneath my rule has grown


s: Year after year in wealth and arts and might:


s: From preaching to an audience fired with faith


s: The Lamb who died to save our souls from death,


s: Whose blood hath washed our scarlet sins wool-white:


s: Crowded with tawdry girls and squalid men,


s: Who hoarsely laugh and curse and brawl and fight:


s: From picturing with all beauty and all grace


s: A luminous rapture unto all men's sight:


s: From writing a great work with patient plan


s: And show how ill must fade and perish quite: