Ballads of a Cheechako Part 7

The bugle is sounding for stables; the men troop off through the gloom; An orderly laying the tables sings in the bright mess-room.

(I'll wash in the prison bucket, and brush with the prison broom.)

I'll lie in my cell and listen; I'll wish that I couldn't hear The laugh and the chaff of the fellows swigging the canteen beer; The nasal tone of the gramophone playing "The Bandolier".

And it seems to me, though it's misty, that night of the flowing bowl, That the man who potlatched the whiskey and landed me into the hole _Was Grubbe, that Unmerciful Bounder, Grubbe, of the City Patrol_.

The Telegraph Operator

I will not wash my face; I will not brush my hair; I "pig" around the place-- There's n.o.body to care.

Nothing but rock and tree; Nothing but wood and stone, Oh, G.o.d, it's h.e.l.l to be Alone, alone, alone!

Snow-peaks and deep-gashed draws Corral me in a ring.

I feel as if I was The only living thing On all this blighted earth; And so I frowst and shrink, And crouching by my hearth I hear the thoughts I think.

I think of all I miss-- The boys I used to know; The girls I used to kiss; The coin I used to blow: The bars I used to haunt; The racket and the row; The beers I didn't want (I wish I had 'em now).

Day after day the same, Only a little worse; No one to grouch or blame-- Oh, for a loving curse!

Oh, in the night I fear, Haunted by nameless things, Just for a voice to cheer, Just for a hand that clings!

Faintly as from a star Voices come o'er the line; Voices of ghosts afar, Not in this world of mine; Lives in whose loom I grope; Words in whose weft I hear Eager the thrill of hope, Awful the chill of fear.

I'm thinking out aloud; I reckon that is bad; (The snow is like a shroud)-- Maybe I'm going mad.

Say! wouldn't that be tough?

This awful hush that hugs And chokes one is enough To make a man go "bugs".

There's not a thing to do; I cannot sleep at night; No wonder I'm so blue; Oh, for a friendly fight!

The din and rush of strife; A music-hall aglow; A crowd, a city, life-- Dear G.o.d, I miss it so!

Here, you have moped enough!

Brace up and play the game!

But say, it's awful tough-- Day after day the same (I've said that twice, I bet).

Well, there's not much to say.

I wish I had a pet, Or something I could play.

Cheer up! don't get so glum And sick of everything; The worst is yet to come; G.o.d help you till the Spring.

G.o.d shield you from the Fear; Teach you to laugh, not moan.

Ha! ha! it sounds so queer-- Alone, alone, alone!

The Wood-Cutter

_The sky is like an envelope, One of those blue official things; And, sealing it, to mock our hope, The moon, a silver wafer, clings.

What shall we find when death gives leave To read--our sentence or reprieve?_

I'm holding it down on G.o.d's sc.r.a.p-pile, up on the f.a.g-end of earth; O'er me a menace of mountains, a river that grits at my feet; Face to face with my soul-self, weighing my life at its worth; Wondering what I was made for, here in my last retreat.

Last! Ah, yes, it's the finish. Have ever you heard a man cry?

(Sobs that rake him and rend him, right from the base of the chest.) That's how I've cried, oh, so often; and now that my tears are dry, I sit in the desolate quiet and wait for the infinite Rest.

Rest! Well, it's restful around me; it's quiet clean to the core.

The mountains pose in their ermine, in golden the hills are clad; The big, blue, silt-freighted Yukon seethes by my cabin door, And I think it's only the river that keeps me from going mad.

By day it's a ruthless monster, a callous, insatiate thing, With oily bubble and eddy, with sudden swirling of breast; By night it's a writhing t.i.tan, sullenly murmuring, Ever and ever goaded, and ever crying for rest.

It cries for its human tribute, but me it will never drown.

I've learned the lore of my river; my river obeys me well.

I hew and I launch my cordwood, and raft it to Dawson town, Where wood means wine and women, and, incidentally, h.e.l.l.

h.e.l.l and the anguish thereafter. Here as I sit alone I'd give the life I have left me to lighten some load of care: (The bitterest part of the bitter is being denied to atone; Lips that have mocked at Heaven lend themselves ill to prayer.)

_Impotent as a beetle pierced on the needle of Fate; A wretch in a cosmic death-cell, peaks for my prison bars; 'Whelmed by a world stupendous, lonely and listless I wait, Drowned in a sea of silence, strewn with confetti of stars_.

See! from far up the valley a rapier pierces the night, The white search-ray of a steamer. Swiftly, serenely it nears; A proud, white, alien presence, a glittering galley of light, Confident-poised, triumphant, freighted with hopes and fears.

I look as one looks on a vision; I see it pulsating by; I glimpse joy-radiant faces; I hear the thresh of the wheel.

Hoof-like my heart beats a moment; then silence swoops from the sky.

Darkness is piled upon darkness. G.o.d only knows how I feel.

Maybe you've seen me sometimes; maybe you've pitied me then-- The lonely waif of the wood-camp, here by my cabin door.

Some day you'll look and see not; futile and outcast of men, I shall be far from your pity, resting forevermore.

_My life was a problem in ciphers, a weary and profitless sum.

Slipshod and stupid I worked it, dazed by negation and doubt.

Ciphers the total confronts me. Oh, Death, with thy moistened thumb, Stoop like a petulant schoolboy, wipe me forever out!_

The Song of the Mouth-Organ

(With apologies to the singer of the "Song of the Banjo".)

I'm a homely little bit of tin and bone; I'm beloved by the Legion of the Lost; I haven't got a "vox humana" tone, And a dime or two will satisfy my cost.

I don't attempt your high-falutin' flights; I am more or less uncertain on the key; But I tell you, boys, there's lots and lots of nights When you've taken mighty comfort out of me.

I weigh an ounce or two, and I'm so small You can pack me in the pocket of your vest; And when at night so wearily you crawl Into your bunk and stretch your limbs to rest, You take me out and play me soft and low, The simple songs that trouble your heartstrings; The tunes you used to fancy long ago, Before you made a rotten mess of things.

Then a dreamy look will come into your eyes, And you break off in the middle of a note; And then, with just the dreariest of sighs, You drop me in the pocket of your coat.

But somehow I have bucked you up a bit; And, as you turn around and face the wall, You don't feel quite so spineless and unfit-- You're not so bad a fellow after all.

Do you recollect the bitter Arctic night; Your camp beside the canyon on the trail; Your tent a tiny square of orange light; The moon above consumptive-like and pale; Your supper cooked, your little stove aglow; You tired, but snug and happy as a child?