Modern Prose And Poetry; For Secondary Schools Part 36

Oceans calling each to each; Hostile hearts, with kindred speech.

Every work that t.i.tans can; Every marvel: save a man, Who might rule without a sword.-- Is a man more precious, Lord?

Can it be?--Must we then Render back to Thee again Million, million wasted men?

Men, of flickering human breath, Only made for life and death?

Ah, but see the sovereign Few, Highly favored, that remain!

These, the glorious residue, Of the cherished race of Cain.

These, the magnates of the age, High above the human wage, Who have numbered and possesst All the portion of the rest!

What are all despairs and shames, What the mean, forgotten names Of the thousand more or less, For one surfeit of success?

For those dullest lives we spent, Take these Few magnificent!

For that host of blotted ones, Take these glittering central suns.

Few;--but how their l.u.s.tre thrives On the million broken lives!

Splendid, over dark and doubt, For a million souls gone out!

These, the holders of our h.o.a.rd,-- Wilt thou not accept them, Lord?

V

Oh in the wakening thunders of the heart, --The small lost Eden, troubled through the night, Sounds there not now,--forboded and apart, Some voice and sword of light?

Some voice and portent of a dawn to break?-- Searching like G.o.d, the ruinous human shard Of that lost Brother-man Himself did make, And Man himself hath marred?

It sounds!--And may the anguish of that birth Seize on the world; and may all shelters fail, Till we behold new Heaven and new Earth Through the rent Temple-vail!

When the high-tides that threaten near and far To sweep away our guilt before the sky,-- Flooding the waste of this dishonored Star, Cleanse, and o'ewhelm, and cry!

Cry, from the deep of world-accusing waves, With longing more than all since Light began, Above the nations,--underneath the graves,-- 'Give back the Singing Man!'

NOTES

=and it was good=:--Genesis, 1:31: "And G.o.d saw all that he had made, and, behold, it was very good."

=the ancient threat of deserts=:--Isaiah, 35:1-2: "The desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose."

=after his laboring=:--Luke, 10:7, and 1st Timothy, 5:18: "The laborer is worthy of his hire."

=portion of his labor=:--Ecclesiastes, 2:10: "For my heart rejoiced in my labor; and this was my portion of all my labor."

=the light is sweet=:--Ecclesiastes, 11:7: "Truly the light is sweet, and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun."

=How long=:--Revelation, 6:10: "How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?"

=when the sea=:--Revelation, 20:13: "And the sea gave up the dead which were in it."

=rejected and despised=:--For this and the remainder of the stanza, see Isaiah, 53.

=t.i.tans=:--In Greek mythology, powerful and troublesome giants.

=Cain=:--See the story of Cain, Genesis, 4:2-16.

=searching like G.o.d=:--Genesis, 4:9: "And the Lord said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not! Am I my brother's keeper?"

=Temple-vail=:--At the death of Christ, the vail of the temple was rent; see Matthew, 27:51.

SUGGESTIONS FOR STUDY[15]

Read the poem slowly and thoughtfully. The "singing man" is the laborer who, in days gone by, was happy in his work. People were not crowded into great cities, and there was more simple out-door labor than there is now, and less strife for wealth.

_Above the vineyards_: In Europe, vineyards are often planted on the slopes of hills and mountains. What ancient country do you think of in connection with "the corn [grain], the oil, the wine"? Were the laborers happy in that country? What were the "creatures" of man's planting (second stanza)? What was the "ancient threat" of deserts? Of what kind of deserts, as described here? Of what deserts would this be true after the rainy season? _Laughed to scorn_: Does this mean "outdid"? Mentally insert the word _something_ after _still_ in the second line of the third stanza. If the laborer in times gone by did not sing for abundance, what did he sing for (stanza three)? The verses in italics are a kind of refrain, as if the laborer were singing to himself. _So is it said and sung_ refers to the fact that these lines are adapted from pa.s.sages in the Bible. _This last ambush_: What does the author mean here by suggesting that the laborer has been entrapped? Who are "they"

in the line "'Enough for him,' they said"? How did they take away "the corn, the oil, the wine"? How did they take away "the air and the sun"?

Who now has the product of the workman's toil? What are "the eyes of Need"? Is it true that one may work hard and still be in need? If it is true, who is to blame? What are "dim" faces? Why does the author begin the word _Man_ with a capital? What effect does too much hard work have upon the laborer? What is "the crooked air"? Who is represented as saying _Why_? How does the world forbid the laborer to live? Why are there dotted lines before and after _Why_ and _What_ and _How long_? Who are meant by _Them_ in the line beginning "Only lets"? Why does the author say that the prisons are filled with ill-used laborers? What does she mean by saying that the prisoners are "bruised for our iniquities"?

What is gained here by using the language of the Bible? _The all-but-human_ means "almost intelligent"--referring to machinery. Does the author mean to praise the "sovereign Few"? Who are these "Few magnificent"? Are they really to blame for the sufferings of the poor?

_Himself_ in the line beginning "Of that lost," refers to G.o.d. What is meant here by "a new Heaven and a new Earth"? What is "this dishonored Star"? What conditions does the author think will bring back the singing man? Are they possible conditions?

Re-read the poem, thinking of the author's protest against the sufferings of the poor and the selfishness of the rich. What do you think of the poem?

COLLATERAL READINGS

The Singing Man and Other Poems Josephine Preston Peabody The Piper " " "

The Singing Leaves " " "

Fortune and Men's Eyes " " "

The Wolf of Gubbio " " "

The Man with the Hoe Edwin Markham

THE DANCE OF THE BON-ODORI

LAFCADIO HEARN

(From _Glimpses of Unfamiliar j.a.pan_, Volume I, Chapter VI)

I

At last, from the verge of an enormous ridge, the roadway suddenly slopes down into a vista of high peaked roofs of thatch and green-mossed eaves--into a village like a colored print out of old Hiroshige's picture-books, a village with all its tints and colors precisely like the tints and colors of the landscape in which it lies. This is Kami-Ichi, in the land of Hoki.

We halt before a quiet, dingy little inn, whose host, a very aged man, comes forth to salute me; while a silent, gentle crowd of villagers, mostly children and women, gather about the kuruma to see the stranger, to wonder at him, even to touch his clothes with timid smiling curiosity. One glance at the face of the old inn-keeper decides me to accept his invitation. I must remain here until to-morrow: my runners are too wearied to go farther to-night.

Weather-worn as the little inn seemed without, it is delightful within.

Its polished stairway and balconies are speckless, reflecting like mirror-surfaces the bare feet of the maid-servants; its luminous rooms are fresh and sweet-smelling as when their soft mattings were first laid down. The carven pillars of the alcove (toko) in my chamber, leaves and flowers chiseled in some black rich wood, are wonders; and the kakemono or scroll-picture hanging there is an idyl, Hotei, G.o.d of Happiness, drifting in a bark down some shadowy stream into evening mysteries of vapory purple. Far as this hamlet is from all art-centres, there is no object visible in the house which does not reveal the j.a.panese sense of beauty in form. The old gold-flowered lacquer-ware, the astonishing box in which sweetmeats (kwashi) are kept, the diaphanous porcelain wine-cups dashed with a single tiny gold figure of a leaping shrimp, the tea-cup holders which are curled lotus-leaves of bronze, even the iron kettle with its figurings of dragons and clouds, and the brazen hibachi whose handles are heads of Buddhist lions, delight the eye and surprise the fancy. Indeed, wherever to-day in j.a.pan one sees something totally uninteresting in porcelain or metal, something commonplace and ugly, one may be almost sure that detestable something has been shaped under foreign influence. But here I am in ancient j.a.pan; probably no European eyes ever looked upon these things before.

A window shaped like a heart peeps out upon the garden, a wonderful little garden with a tiny pond and miniature bridges and dwarf trees, like the landscape of a tea-cup; also some shapely stones of course, and some graceful stone lanterns, or t[=o]r[=o], such as are placed in the courts of temples. And beyond these, through the warm dusk, I see lights, colored lights, the lanterns of the Bonku, suspended before each home to welcome the coming of beloved ghosts; for by the antique calendar, according to which in this antique place the reckoning of time is still made, this is the first night of the Festival of the Dead.

As in all other little country villages where I have been stopping, I find the people here kind to me with a kindness and a courtesy unimaginable, indescribable, unknown in any other country, and even in j.a.pan itself only in the interior. Their simple politeness is not an art; their goodness is absolutely unconscious goodness; both come straight from the heart. And before I have been two hours among these people, their treatment of me, coupled with the sense of my utter inability to repay such kindness, causes a wicked wish to come into my mind. I wish these charming folk would do me some unexpected wrong, something surprisingly evil, something atrociously unkind, so that I should not be obliged to regret them, which I feel sure I must begin to do as soon as I go away.