The Little Book of Modern Verse Part 2

Polyides, the soothsayer, spake it, inflamed by the G.o.d.

Of his son whom the fates singled out did he bruit it abroad; And Euchenor went down to the ships with his armor and men And straightway, grown dim on the gulf, pa.s.sed the isles he pa.s.sed never again.

Why weep ye, O women of Corinth? The doom ye have heard Is it strange to your ears that ye make it so mournful a word?

Is he who so fair in your eyes to his manhood upgrew, Alone in his doom of pale death -- are of mortals the beaten so few?

O weep not, companions and lovers! Turn back to your joys: The defeat was not his which he chose, nor the victory Troy's.

Him a conqueror, beauteous in youth, o'er the flood his fleet brought, And the swift spear of Paris that slew completed the conquest he sought.

Not the falling proclaims the defeat, but the place of the fall; And the fate that decrees and the G.o.d that impels through it all Regard not blind mortals' divisions of slayer and slain, But invisible glories dispense wide over the war-gleaming plain.

He whom a Dream hath possessed. [Shaemas O Sheel]

He whom a dream hath possessed knoweth no more of doubting, For mist and the blowing of winds and the mouthing of words he scorns; Not the sinuous speech of schools he hears, but a knightly shouting, And never comes darkness down, yet he greeteth a million morns.

He whom a dream hath possessed knoweth no more of roaming; All roads and the flowing of waves and the speediest flight he knows, But wherever his feet are set, his soul is forever homing, And going, he comes, and coming he heareth a call and goes.

He whom a dream hath possessed knoweth no more of sorrow, At death and the dropping of leaves and the fading of suns he smiles, For a dream remembers no past and scorns the desire of a morrow, And a dream in a sea of doom sets surely the ultimate isles.

He whom a dream hath possessed treads the impalpable marches, From the dust of the day's long road he leaps to a laughing star, And the ruin of worlds that fall he views from eternal arches, And rides G.o.d's battlefield in a flashing and golden car.

The Kings. [Louise Imogen Guiney]

A man said unto his Angel: "My spirits are fallen low, And I cannot carry this battle: O brother! where might I go?

"The terrible Kings are on me With spears that are deadly bright; Against me so from the cradle Do fate and my fathers fight."

Then said to the man his Angel: "Thou wavering, witless soul, Back to the ranks! What matter To win or to lose the whole,

"As judged by the little judges Who hearken not well, nor see?

Not thus, by the outer issue, The Wise shall interpret thee.

"Thy will is the sovereign measure And only events of things: The puniest heart, defying, Were stronger than all these Kings.

"Though out of the past they gather, Mind's Doubt, and Bodily Pain, And pallid Thirst of the Spirit That is kin to the other twain,

"And Grief, in a cloud of banners, And ringletted Vain Desires, And Vice, with the spoils upon him Of thee and thy beaten sires, --

"While Kings of eternal evil Yet darken the hills about, Thy part is with broken sabre To rise on the last redoubt;

"To fear not sensible failure, Nor covet the game at all, But fighting, fighting, fighting, Die, driven against the wall."

Mockery. [Louis Untermeyer]

G.o.d, I return to You on April days When along country roads You walk with me, And my faith blossoms like the earliest tree That shames the bleak world with its yellow sprays -- My faith revives, when through a rosy haze The clover-sprinkled hills smile quietly, Young winds uplift a bird's clean ecstasy . . .

For this, O G.o.d, my joyousness and praise!

But now -- the crowded streets and choking airs, The squalid people, bruised and tossed about; These, or the over-brilliant thoroughfares, The too-loud laughter and the empty shout, The mirth-mad city, tragic with its cares . . .

For this, O G.o.d, my silence -- and my doubt.

An Ode in Time of Hesitation. [William Vaughn Moody]

I

Before the solemn bronze Saint Gaudens made To thrill the heedless pa.s.ser's heart with awe, And set here in the city's talk and trade To the good memory of Robert Shaw, This bright March morn I stand, And hear the distant spring come up the land; Knowing that what I hear is not unheard Of this boy soldier and his Negro band, For all their gaze is fixed so stern ahead, For all the fatal rhythm of their tread.

The land they died to save from death and shame Trembles and waits, hearing the spring's great name, And by her pangs these resolute ghosts are stirred.

II

Through street and mall the tides of people go Heedless; the trees upon the Common show No hint of green; but to my listening heart The still earth doth impart a.s.surance of her jubilant emprise, And it is clear to my long-searching eyes That love at last has might upon the skies.

The ice is runneled on the little pond; A telltale patter drips from off the trees; The air is touched with Southland spiceries, As if but yesterday it tossed the frond Of pendant mosses where the live-oaks grow Beyond Virginia and the Carolines, Or had its will among the fruits and vines Of aromatic isles asleep beyond Florida and the Gulf of Mexico.

III

Soon shall the Cape Ann children shout in glee, Spying the arbutus, spring's dear recluse; Hill lads at dawn shall hearken the wild goose Go honking northward over Tennessee; West from Oswego to Sault Sainte-Marie, And on to where the Pictured Rocks are hung, And yonder where, gigantic, wilful, young, Chicago sitteth at the northwest gates, With restless violent hands and casual tongue Moulding her mighty fates, The Lakes shall robe them in ethereal sheen; And like a larger sea, the vital green Of springing wheat shall vastly be outflung Over Dakota and the prairie states.

By desert people immemorial On Arizonan mesas shall be done Dim rites unto the thunder and the sun; Nor shall the primal G.o.ds lack sacrifice More splendid, when the white Sierras call Unto the Rockies straightway to arise And dance before the unveiled ark of the year Sounding their windy cedars as for shawms, Unrolling rivers clear For flutter of broad phylacteries; While Shasta signals to Alaskan seas That watch old sluggish glaciers downward creep To fling their icebergs thundering from the steep, And Mariposa through the purple calms Gazes at far Hawaii crowned with palms Where East and West are met, -- A rich seal on the ocean's bosom set To say that East and West are twain, With different loss and gain: The Lord hath sundered them; let them be sundered yet.

IV

Alas! what sounds are these that come Sullenly over the Pacific seas, -- Sounds of ign.o.ble battle, striking dumb The season's half-awakened ecstasies?

Must I be humble, then, Now when my heart hath need of pride?

Wild love falls on me from these sculptured men; By loving much the land for which they died I would be justified.

My spirit was away on pinions wide To soothe in praise of her its pa.s.sionate mood And ease it of its ache of grat.i.tude.

Too sorely heavy is the debt they lay On me and the companions of my day.

I would remember now My country's goodliness, make sweet her name.

Alas! what shade art thou Of sorrow or of blame Liftest the lyric leaf.a.ge from her brow, And pointest a slow finger at her shame?