Rivers to the Sea Part 6

To one so humble as myself It should be matter for some pride To have such noted fellows here, Conferring at my side.

THE INN OF EARTH

I CAME to the crowded Inn of Earth, And called for a cup of wine, But the Host went by with averted eye From a thirst as keen as mine.

Then I sat down with weariness And asked a bit of bread, But the Host went by with averted eye And never a word he said.

While always from the outer night The waiting souls came in With stifled cries of sharp surprise At all the light and din.

"Then give me a bed to sleep," I said, "For midnight comes apace"-- But the Host went by with averted eye And I never saw his face.

"Since there is neither food nor rest, I go where I fared before"-- But the Host went by with averted eye And barred the outer door.

IN THE CARPENTER'S SHOP

MARY sat in the corner dreaming, Dim was the room and low, While in the dusk, the saw went screaming To and fro.

Jesus and Joseph toiled together, Mary was watching them, Thinking of kings in the wintry weather At Bethlehem.

Mary sat in the corner thinking, Jesus had grown a man; One by one her hopes were sinking As the years ran.

Jesus and Joseph toiled together, Mary's thoughts were far-- Angels sang in the wintry weather Under a star.

Mary sat in the corner weeping, Bitter and hot her tears-- Little faith were the angels keeping All the years.

THE CARPENTER'S SON

THE summer dawn came over-soon, The earth was like hot iron at noon In Nazareth; There fell no rain to ease the heat, And dusk drew on with tired feet And stifled breath.

The shop was low and hot and square, And fresh-cut wood made sharp the air, While all day long The saw went tearing thru the oak That moaned as tho' the tree's heart broke Beneath its wrong.

The narrow street was full of cries, Of bickering and snarling lies In many keys-- The tongues of Egypt and of Rome And lands beyond the shifting foam Of windy seas.

Sometimes a ruler riding fast Scattered the dark crowds as he pa.s.sed, And drove them close In doorways, drawing broken breath Lest they be trampled to their death Where the dust rose.

There in the gathering night and noise A group of Galilean boys Crowding to see Gray Joseph toiling with his son, Saw Jesus, when the task was done, Turn wearily.

He pa.s.sed them by with hurried tread Silently, nor raised his head, He who looked up Drinking all beauty from his birth Out of the heaven and the earth As from a cup.

And Mary, who was growing old, Knew that the pottage would be cold When he returned; He hungered only for the night, And westward, bending sharp and bright, The thin moon burned.

He reached the open western gate Where whining halt and leper wait, And came at last To the blue desert, where the deep Great seas of twilight lay asleep, Windless and vast.

With shining eyes the stars awoke, The dew lay heavy on his cloak, The world was dim; And in the stillness he could hear His secret thoughts draw very near And call to him.

Faint voices lifted shrill with pain And mult.i.tudinous as rain; From all the lands And all the villages thereof Men crying for the gift of love With outstretched hands.

Voices that called with ceaseless crying, The broken and the blind, the dying, And those grown dumb Beneath oppression, and he heard Upon their lips a single word, "Come!"

Their cries engulfed him like the night, The moon put out her placid light And black and low Nearer the heavy thunder drew, Hushing the voices . . . yet he knew That he would go.

A quick-spun thread of lightning burns, And for a flash the day returns-- He only hears Joseph, an old man bent and white Toiling alone from morn till night Thru all the years.

Swift clouds make all the heavens blind, A storm is running on the wind-- He only sees How Mary will stretch out her hands Sobbing, who never understands Voices like these.

THE MOTHER OF A POET

SHE is too kind, I think, for mortal things, Too gentle for the gusty ways of earth; G.o.d gave to her a shy and silver mirth, And made her soul as clear And softly singing as an orchard spring's In sheltered hollows all the sunny year-- A spring that thru the leaning gra.s.s looks up And holds all heaven in its clarid cup, Mirror to holy meadows high and blue With stars like drops of dew.

I love to think that never tears at night Have made her eyes less bright; That all her girlhood thru Never a cry of love made over-tense Her voice's innocence; That in her hands have lain, Flowers beaten by the rain, And little birds before they learned to sing Drowned in the sudden ecstasy of spring.

I love to think that with a wistful wonder She held her baby warm against her breast; That never any fear awoke whereunder She shuddered at her gift, or trembled lest Thru the great doors of birth Here to a windy earth She lured from heaven a half-unwilling guest.

She caught and kept his first vague flickering smile, The faint upleaping of his spirit's fire; And for a long sweet while In her was all he asked of earth or heaven-- But in the end how far, Past every shaken star, Should leap at last that arrow-like desire, His full-grown manhood's keen Ardor toward the unseen Dark mystery beyond the Pleiads seven.

And in her heart she heard His first dim-spoken word-- She only of them all could understand, Flushing to feel at last The silence over-past, Thrilling as tho' her hand had touched G.o.d's hand.

But in the end how many words Winged on a flight she could not follow, Farther than skyward lark or swallow, His lips should free to lands she never knew; Braver than white sea-faring birds With a fearless melody, Flying over a shining sea, A star-white song between the blue and blue.

Oh I have seen a lake as clear and fair As it were molten air, Lifting a lily upward to the sun.

How should the water know the glowing heart That ever to the heaven lifts its fire, A golden and unchangeable desire?

The water only knows The faint and rosy glows Of under-petals, opening apart.

Yet in the soul of earth, Deep in the primal ground, Its searching roots are wound, And centuries have struggled toward its birth.

So, in the man who sings, All of the voiceless horde From the cold dawn of things Have their reward; All in whose pulses ran Blood that is his at last, From the first stooping man Far in the winnowed past.

Out of the tumult of their love and mating Each one created, seeing life was good-- Dumb, till at last the song that they were waiting Breaks like brave April thru a wintry wood.

RIVERS TO THE SEA

But what of her whose heart is troubled by it, The mother who would soothe and set him free, Fearing the song's storm-shaken ecstasy-- Oh, as the moon that has no power to quiet The strong wind-driven sea.

IN MEMORIAM F. O. S.