Poems By the Way Part 5

How long, and for what is their patience abiding?

How oft and how oft shall their story be told, While the hope that none seeketh in darkness is hiding, And in grief and in sorrow the world groweth old?

Come back to the inn, love, and the lights and the fire, And the fiddler's old tune and the shuffling of feet; For there in a while shall be rest and desire, And there shall the morrow's uprising be sweet.

Yet, love, as we wend, the wind bloweth behind us, And beareth the last tale it telleth to-night, How here in the spring-tide the message shall find us; For the hope that none seeketh is coming to light.

Like the seed of midwinter, unheeded, unperished, Like the autumn-sown wheat 'neath the snow lying green, Like the love that o'ertook us, unawares and uncherished, Like the babe 'neath thy girdle that groweth unseen;

So the hope of the people now buddeth and groweth, Rest fadeth before it, and blindness and fear; It biddeth us learn all the wisdom it knoweth; It hath found us and held us, and biddeth us hear:

For it beareth the message: "Rise up on the morrow And go on your ways toward the doubt and the strife; Join hope to our hope and blend sorrow with sorrow, And seek for men's love in the short days of life."

But lo, the old inn, and the lights, and the fire, And the fiddler's old tune and the shuffling of feet; Soon for us shall be quiet and rest and desire, And to-morrow's uprising to deeds shall be sweet.

A DEATH SONG.

What cometh here from west to east awending?

And who are these, the marchers stern and slow?

We bear the message that the rich are sending Aback to those who bade them wake and know.

_Not one_, _not one_, _nor thousands must they slay_, _But one and all if they would dusk the day_.

We asked them for a life of toilsome earning, They bade us bide their leisure for our bread; We craved to speak to tell our woeful learning: We come back speechless, bearing back our dead.

_Not one_, _not one_, _nor thousands must they slay_, _But one and all if they would dusk the day_.

They will not learn; they have no ears to hearken.

They turn their faces from the eyes of fate; Their gay-lit halls shut out the skies that darken.

But, lo! this dead man knocking at the gate.

_Not one_, _not one_, _nor thousands must they slay_, _But one and all if they would dusk the day_.

Here lies the sign that we shall break our prison; Amidst the storm he won a prisoner's rest; But in the cloudy dawn the sun arisen Brings us our day of work to win the best.

_Not one_, _not one_, _nor thousands must they slay_, _But one and all if they would dusk the day_.

ICELAND FIRST SEEN

Lo from our loitering ship a new land at last to be seen; Toothed rocks down the side of the firth on the east guard a weary wide lea, And black slope the hill-sides above, striped adown with their desolate green: And a peak rises up on the west from the meeting of cloud and of sea, Foursquare from base unto point like the building of G.o.ds that have been, The last of that waste of the mountains all cloud-wreathed and snow-flecked and grey, And bright with the dawn that began just now at the ending of day.

Ah! what came we forth for to see that our hearts are so hot with desire?

Is it enough for our rest, the sight of this desolate strand, And the mountain-waste voiceless as death but for winds that may sleep not nor tire?

Why do we long to wend forth through the length and breadth of a land, Dreadful with grinding of ice, and record of scarce hidden fire, But that there 'mid the grey gra.s.sy dales sore scarred by the ruining streams Lives the tale of the Northland of old and the undying glory of dreams?

O land, as some cave by the sea where the treasures of old have been laid, The sword it may be of a king whose name was the turning of fight: Or the staff of some wise of the world that many things made and unmade.

Or the ring of a woman maybe whose woe is grown wealth and delight.

No wheat and no wine grows above it, no orchard for blossom and shade; The few ships that sail by its blackness but deem it the mouth of a grave; Yet sure when the world shall awaken, this too shall be mighty to save.

Or rather, O land, if a marvel it seemeth that men ever sought Thy wastes for a field and a garden fulfilled of all wonder and doubt, And feasted amidst of the winter when the light of the year had been fought, Whose plunder all gathered together was little to babble about; Cry aloud from thy wastes, O thou land, "Not for this nor for that was I wrought.

Amid waning of realms and of riches and death of things worshipped and sure, I abide here the spouse of a G.o.d, and I made and I make and endure."

O Queen of the grief without knowledge, of the courage that may not avail, Of the longing that may not attain, of the love that shall never forget, More joy than the gladness of laughter thy voice hath amidst of its wail: More hope than of pleasure fulfilled amidst of thy blindness is set; More glorious than gaining of all thine unfaltering hand that shall fail: For what is the mark on thy brow but the brand that thy Brynhild doth bear?

Lone once, and loved and undone by a love that no ages outwear.

Ah! when thy Balder comes back, and bears from the heart of the Sun Peace and the healing of pain, and the wisdom that waiteth no more; And the lilies are laid on thy brow 'mid the crown of the deeds thou hast done; And the roses spring up by thy feet that the rocks of the wilderness wore.

Ah! when thy Balder comes back and we gather the gains he hath won, Shall we not linger a little to talk of thy sweetness of old, Yea, turn back awhile to thy travail whence the G.o.ds stood aloof to behold?

THE RAVEN AND THE KING'S DAUGHTER.

King's daughter sitting in tower so high, _Fair summer is on many a shield_.

Why weepest thou as the clouds go by?

_Fair sing the swans 'twixt firth and field_.

Why weepest thou in the window-seat Till the tears run through thy fingers sweet?

_The King's Daughter_.

I weep because I sit alone Betwixt these walls of lime and stone.

Fair folk are in my father's hall, But for me he built this guarded wall.

And here the gold on the green I sew Nor tidings of my true-love know.

_The Raven_.

King's daughter, sitting above the sea, I shall tell thee a tale shall gladden thee.

Yestreen I saw a ship go forth When the wind blew merry from the north.

And by the tiller Steingrim sat, And O, but my heart was glad thereat!

For 'twixt ashen plank and dark blue sea His sword sang sweet of deeds to be.

_The King's Daughter_.

O barren sea, thou bitter bird, And a barren tale my ears have heard.

_The Raven_.

Thy father's men were hard thereby In byrny bright and helmet high.

_The King's Daughter_.