Poems of Power Part 15

Those gravediggers, Doubt, Distrust, They will lower him to the dust.

Let us part here with a kiss - You go that way, I go this.

Since we buried Love to-day We will walk a separate way.

"LOVE IS ENOUGH"

Love is enough. Let us not ask for gold.

Wealth breeds false aims, and pride, and selfishness; In those serene, Arcadian days of old Men gave no thought to princely homes and dress.

The G.o.ds who dwelt on fair Olympia's height Lived only for dear love and love's delight.

Love is enough.

Love is enough. Why should we care for fame?

Ambition is a most unpleasant guest: It lures us with the glory of a name Far from the happy haunts of peace and rest.

Let us stay here in this secluded place Made beautiful by love's endearing grace!

Love is enough.

Love is enough. Why should we strive for power?

It brings men only envy and distrust.

The poor world's homage pleases but an hour, And earthly honours vanish in the dust.

The grandest lives are ofttimes desolate; Let me be loved, and let who will be great.

Love is enough.

Love is enough. Why should we ask for more?

What greater gift have G.o.ds vouchsafed to men?

What better boon of all their precious store Than our fond hearts that love and love again?

Old love may die; new love is just as sweet; And life is fair and all the world complete: Love is enough!

LIFE IS A PRIVILEGE

Life is a privilege. Its youthful days Shine with the radiance of continuous Mays.

To live, to breathe, to wonder and desire, To feed with dreams the heart's perpetual fire, To thrill with virtuous pa.s.sions, and to glow With great ambitions--in one hour to know The depths and heights of feeling--G.o.d! in truth, How beautiful, how beautiful is youth!

Life is a privilege. Like some rare rose The mysteries of the human mind unclose.

What marvels lie in earth, and air, and sea!

What stores of knowledge wait our opening key!

What sunny roads of happiness lead out Beyond the realms of indolence and doubt!

And what large pleasures smile upon and bless The busy avenues of usefulness!

Life is a privilege. Though noontide fades And shadows fall along the winding glades, Though joy-blooms wither in the autumn air, Yet the sweet scent of sympathy is there.

Pale sorrow leads us closer to our kind, And in the serious hours of life we find Depths in the souls of men which lend new worth And majesty to this brief span of earth.

Life is a privilege. If some sad fate Sends us alone to seek the exit gate, If men forsake us and as shadows fall, Still does the supreme privilege of all Come in that reaching upward of the soul To find the welcoming Presence at the goal, And in the Knowledge that our feet have trod Paths that led from, and must wind back, to G.o.d.

INSIGHT

Sirs, when you pity us, I say You waste your pity. Let it stay, Well corked and stored upon your shelves, Until you need it for yourselves.

We do appreciate G.o.d's thought In forming you, before He brought Us into life. His art was crude, But oh! so virile in its rude,

Large, elemental strength; and then He learned His trade in making men, Learned how to mix and mould the clay And fashion in a finer way.

How fine that skilful way can be You need but lift your eyes to see; And we are glad G.o.d placed you there To lift your eyes and find us fair.

Apprentice labour though you were, He made you great enough to stir The best and deepest depths of us, And we are glad He made you thus.

Aye! we are glad of many things; G.o.d strung our hearts with such fine strings The least breath moves them, and we hear Music where silence greets your ear.

We suffer so? But women's souls, Like violet-powder dropped on coals, Give forth their best in anguish. Oh The subtle secrets that we know

Of joy in sorrow, strange delights Of ecstasy in pain-filled nights, And mysteries of gain in loss Known but to Christ upon the cross!

Our tears are pitiful to you?

Look how the heaven-reflecting dew Dissolves its life in tears. The sand Meanwhile lies hard upon the strand.

How could your pity find a place For us, the mothers of the race?

Men may be fathers unaware, So poor the t.i.tle is you wear.

But mothers--who that crown adorns Knows all its mingled blooms and thorns, And she whose feet that pain hath trod Hath walked upon the heights with G.o.d.

No, offer us not pity's cup.

There is no looking down or up Between us; eye looks straight in eye: Born equals, so we live and die.

A WOMAN'S ANSWER

You call me an angel of love and of light, A being of goodness and heavenly fire, Sent out from G.o.d's kingdom to guide you aright, In paths where your spirit may mount and aspire, You say that I glow like a star on its course, Like a ray from the altar, a spark from the source.

Now list to my answer--let all the world hear it, I speak unafraid what I know to be true - A pure, faithful love is the creative spirit Which make women angels! I live but in you.

We are bound soul to soul by life's holiest laws; If I am an angel--why, you are the cause.

As my ship skims the sea, I look up from the deck.