Complete Poetical Works by Bret Harte Part 34

Naught but myself; nor form nor figure breaking The long hushed level and stark shining waste; Nothing that moves to fill the vision aching, When the last shadow fled in sullen haste.

Nothing beyond. Ah yes! From out the station A stiff, gaunt figure thrown against the sky, Beckoning me with some wooden salutation Caught from his signals as the train flashed by;

Yielding me place beside him with dumb gesture Born of that reticence of sky and air.

We sit apart, yet wrapped in that one vesture Of silence, sadness, and unspoken care:

Each following his own thought,--around us darkening The rain-washed boundaries and stretching track,-- Each following those dim parallels and hearkening For long-lost voices that will not come back.

Until, unasked,--I knew not why or wherefore,-- He yielded, bit by bit, his dreary past, Like gathered clouds that seemed to thicken there for Some dull down-dropping of their care at last.

Long had he lived there. As a boy had started From the stacked corn the Indian's painted face; Heard the wolves' howl the wearying waste that parted His father's hut from the last camping-place.

Nature had mocked him: thrice had claimed the reaping, With scythe of fire, of lands she once had sown; Sent the tornado, round his hearthstone heaping Rafters, dead faces that were like his own.

Then came the War Time. When its shadow beckoned He had walked dumbly where the flag had led Through swamp and fen,--unknown, unpraised, unreckoned,-- To famine, fever, and a prison bed.

Till the storm pa.s.sed, and the slow tide returning Cast him, a wreck, beneath his native sky; Here, at his watch, gave him the chance of earning Scant means to live--who won the right to die.

All this I heard--or seemed to hear--half blending With the low murmur of the coming breeze, The call of some lost bird, and the unending And tireless sobbing of those gra.s.sy seas.

Until at last the spell of desolation Broke with a trembling star and far-off cry.

The coming train! I glanced around the station, All was as empty as the upper sky!

Naught but myself; nor form nor figure waking The long hushed level and stark shining waste; Naught but myself, that cry, and the dull shaking Of wheel and axle, stopped in breathless haste!

"Now, then--look sharp! Eh, what? The Station-Master?

THAR'S NONE! We stopped here of our own accord.

The man got killed in that down-train disaster This time last evening. Right there! All aboard!"

THE MISSION BELLS OF MONTEREY

O bells that rang, O bells that sang Above the martyrs' wilderness, Till from that reddened coast-line sprang The Gospel seed to cheer and bless, What are your garnered sheaves to-day?

O Mission bells! Eleison bells!

O Mission bells of Monterey!

O bells that crash, O bells that clash Above the chimney-crowded plain, On wall and tower your voices dash, But never with the old refrain; In mart and temple gone astray!

Ye dangle bells! Ye jangle bells!

Ye wrangle bells of Monterey!

O bells that die, so far, so nigh, Come back once more across the sea; Not with the zealot's furious cry, Not with the creed's austerity; Come with His love alone to stay, O Mission bells! Eleison bells!

O Mission bells of Monterey!

* This poem was set to music by Monsieur Charles Gounod.

"CROTALUS"

(RATTLESNAKE BAR, SIERRAS)

No life in earth, or air, or sky; The sunbeams, broken silently, On the bared rocks around me lie,--

Cold rocks with half-warmed lichens scarred, And scales of moss; and scarce a yard Away, one long strip, yellow-barred.

Lost in a cleft! 'Tis but a stride To reach it, thrust its roots aside, And lift it on thy stick astride!

Yet stay! That moment is thy grace!

For round thee, thrilling air and s.p.a.ce, A chattering terror fills the place!

A sound as of dry bones that stir In the dead Valley! By yon fir The locust stops its noonday whir!

The wild bird hears; smote with the sound, As if by bullet brought to ground, On broken wing, dips, wheeling round!

The hare, transfixed, with trembling lip, Halts, breathless, on pulsating hip, And palsied tread, and heels that slip.

Enough, old friend!--'tis thou. Forget My heedless foot, nor longer fret The peace with thy grim castanet!

I know thee! Yes! Thou mayst forego That lifted crest; the measured blow Beyond which thy pride scorns to go,

Or yet retract! For me no spell Lights those slit orbs, where, some think, dwell Machicolated fires of h.e.l.l!

I only know thee humble, bold, Haughty, with miseries untold, And the old Curse that left thee cold,

And drove thee ever to the sun, On blistering rocks; nor made thee shun Our cabin's hearth, when day was done,

And the spent ashes warmed thee best; We knew thee,--silent, joyless guest Of our rude ingle. E'en thy quest

Of the rare milk-bowl seemed to be Naught but a brother's poverty, And Spartan taste that kept thee free

From l.u.s.t and rapine. Thou! whose fame Searchest the gra.s.s with tongue of flame, Making all creatures seem thy game;

When the whole woods before thee run, Asked but--when all was said and done-- To lie, untrodden, in the sun!

ON WILLIAM FRANCIS BARTLETT

DEAD AT PITTSFIELD, Ma.s.s., 1876

O poor Romancer--thou whose printed page, Filled with rude speech and ruder forms of strife, Was given to heroes in whose vulgar rage No trace appears of gentler ways and life!--

Thou who wast wont of commoner clay to build Some rough Achilles or some Ajax tall; Thou whose free brush too oft was wont to gild Some single virtue till it dazzled all;--