The Path of Dreams Part 4

He had deemed it a cowardly thing to fly While the village prated anent his shame, And an added blot on his n.o.ble name By his own hand to die.

But oft in the deep of night I hear Borne on the wild night wind, The beat of the mare's hoofs thundering past, And my heart is clutched by an icy fear Of a direful thing that may chance at last; For ride he never so far, so fast-- Black Care rides hard behind.

XVI.

Last night as I stood in the gloaming's gray, Ere the moon came into the sky, He came to me for a last good-bye-- At last he is going away.

His face in the dusk showed stern and set, Old and haggard and worn with pain; "Dear, I may never see you again-- Mine but the meed regret!

How can I ask you to share my shame, How can I give you my blemished name, Yet how shall the heart forget?

Naught in my life save a dream have I, A dream--a vision, too fair to be, A rose that blooms 'mid the rue for me-- Naught but a dream ... Good-bye."

And then, ere he lifted his bridle rein To ride away down the dark'ning land, He bent and touched with his lips the hand I had laid on the chestnut's mane.

XVII.

Something ... my senses will scarce recall ...

The horror they came in the night to tell ...

The mare had galloped riderless home, Blown and bleeding and flecked with foam, And they found him there by the sunken wall, Hurt to the death by the desperate fall.

How it had chanced, he could only tell, Ere the merciful numbness stole his brain; How the chestnut rose to the leap and fell....

Then his senses closed on the shocks of pain.

He spoke, they told me, but once again-- To whisper my name with his struggling breath-- (Thank G.o.d, he suffered so brief a while) Then peacefully sank on the breast of Death, Dead, with his lips asmile.

How can I wish him alive again, Lying so peacefully, placidly still, With that carven smile on his marble face.

How can I pray that his heart should thrill To waking and waking's pain?

Lying so peacefully, placidly still.

With the old, sweet smile on his quiet face, Dead to the sting of a heart's disgrace....

How should I wish him a lesser grace, How should I strive with a wiser Will?

Yet how can the heart that is reft divine Death's mystical, measureless charity?

The cry of the stricken king is mine: "Would I had died for thee!"

Severance

Not severed by long leagues of lonely land, Nor sundered by wide wastes of sounding sea; But ever side by side and hand in hand, And yet--apart are we.

Spartacus

He stands storm-browed, imperial, chief Of all Rome's gladiators; brave Beyond all others; fearless in belief, A captive--but no slave.

His brow is like a G.o.d's--a brow of power, Lips soft with human sweetness--ere the day He entered the arena, and the hour He first beheld man's life-blood mixed with clay.

Felt rise within him b.e.s.t.i.a.l strange desires And savage instincts in a brutal heart That battened on men's blood; burned with unhallowed fires Of slaughter--till--a thing apart, A hired butcher of his fellow men, he stands Daring the fasting lion in his den, Or some fierce gladiator on the blood-stained sands,-- A savage chief of yet more savage men!

He stands, with ma.s.sive throat and thews of steel, While loud acclaims the listening heavens fill, And Roman women smile. He does not know; or feel A moment's joy or one triumphant thrill.

He heeds them not. He sees as in a dream His home and Cyrasella's citron groves; A youth again, beside some purling stream, With gladsome heart and joyous pipe he roves.

He sees anon that gentle shepherd boy, Who knew no harsher sound than plaining flute, In the arena stand--Rome's sport and toy-- A b.e.s.t.i.a.l, blood-stained hireling brute....

Then swift thro' every throbbing, pulsing vein The fierce unconquered spirit of old Sparta ran.

Rome's fiercest gladiator is to-day again A Thracian--and a man!

The Dead Leader

After the waiting and the anguished weeping He lies at rest at last.

How should we mourn him tranced in peaceful sleeping, His pain all past!

The Right's Excalibur his strong arm wielded A little s.p.a.ce lies low; The victor in life's sometime strife has yielded To man's last Foe.

Late--all too late--our loyal tribute giving A loyal, fearless soul!

He whom we honored late--so late--while living, Lies dead beside the goal.

Yet this the solace of these long sad hours While we who loved him weep, We breathe an answering message in our flowers To him who lies asleep.

To him whom soon the deep, cold earth must cover, To him whose dying breath Left to our hearts a message bridging over The dark abyss of Death.

Hagar

To have known Heaven and then to walk in h.e.l.l!

Is it not h.e.l.l to know his face no more, Supplanted, spurned and thrust without his door.

Seeing another with my loved lord dwell Sheltered within the tents of wedded love While I must roam the desert of Despair?

Ah, G.o.d above me harken to my prayer!

Send down thy mercy on me as a dove Folding its white wings on my tortured breast.

Let me not see the anguish of my child With hunger torn, with thirst's consuming wild, Strike us, oh G.o.d, into Thy deep dark Rest!

Lo! I have sinned. I kneel and kiss the rod, But she, the wife, who cast us forth to die ...

I curse her not! Judge Thou between us, G.o.d, Which in Thy sight is guiltier, she or I?

Water-Lilies