The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes Part 37

MARE RUBRUM

1858

FLASH out a stream of blood-red wine, For I would drink to other days, And brighter shall their memory shine, Seen flaming through its crimson blaze!

The roses die, the summers fade, But every ghost of boyhood's dream By nature's magic power is laid To sleep beneath this blood-red stream!

It filled the purple grapes that lay, And drank the splendors of the sun, Where the long summer's cloudless day Is mirrored in the broad Garonne; It pictures still the bacchant shapes That saw their h.o.a.rded sunlight shed,-- The maidens dancing on the grapes,-- Their milk-white ankles splashed with red.

Beneath these waves of crimson lie, In rosy fetters prisoned fast, Those flitting shapes that never die,-- The swift-winged visions of the past.

Kiss but the crystal's mystic rim, Each shadow rends its flowery chain, Springs in a bubble from its brim, And walks the chambers of the brain.

Poor beauty! Time and fortune's wrong No shape nor feature may withstand; Thy wrecks are scattered all along, Like emptied sea-sh.e.l.ls on the sand; Yet, sprinkled with this blushing rain, The dust restores each blooming girl, As if the sea-sh.e.l.ls moved again Their glistening lips of pink and pearl.

Here lies the home of school-boy life, With creaking stair and wind-swept hall, And, scarred by many a truant knife, Our old initials on the wall; Here rest, their keen vibrations mute, The shout of voices known so well, The ringing laugh, the wailing flute, The chiding of the sharp-tongued bell.

Here, clad in burning robes, are laid Life's blossomed joys, untimely shed, And here those cherished forms have strayed We miss awhile, and call them dead.

What wizard fills the wondrous gla.s.s?

What soil the enchanted cl.u.s.ters grew?

That buried pa.s.sions wake and pa.s.s In beaded drops of fiery dew?

Nay, take the cup of blood-red wine,-- Our hearts can boast a warmer glow, Filled from a vintage more divine, Calmed, but not chilled, by winter's snow!

To-night the palest wave we sip Rich as the priceless draught shall be That wet the bride of Cana's lip,-- The wedding wine of Galilee!

THE BOYS

1859

HAS there any old fellow got mixed with the boys?

If there has, take him out, without making a noise.

Hang the Almanac's cheat and the Catalogue's spite!

Old Time is a liar! We're twenty to-night!

We're twenty! We're twenty! Who says we are more?

He's tipsy,--young jackanapes!--show him the door!

"Gray temples at twenty?"--Yes! white if we please; Where the snow-flakes fall thickest there's nothing can freeze!

Was it snowing I spoke of? Excuse the mistake!

Look close,--you will see not a sign of a flake!

We want some new garlands for those we have shed,-- And these are white roses in place of the red.

We've a trick, we young fellows, you may have been told, Of talking (in public) as if we were old:-- That boy we call "Doctor," and this we call "Judge;"

It 's a neat little fiction,--of course it 's all fudge.

That fellow's the "Speaker,"--the one on the right; "Mr. Mayor," my young one, how are you to-night?

That's our "Member of Congress," we say when we chaff; There's the "Reverend" What's his name?--don't make me laugh.

That boy with the grave mathematical look Made believe he had written a wonderful book, And the ROYAL SOCIETY thought it was _true_!

So they chose him right in; a good joke it was, too!

There's a boy, we pretend, with a three-decker brain, That could harness a team with a logical chain; When he spoke for our manhood in syllabled fire, We called him "The Justice," but now he's "The Squire."

And there's a nice youngster of excellent pith,-- Fate tried to conceal him by naming him Smith; But he shouted a song for the brave and the free,-- Just read on his medal, "My country," "of thee!"

You hear that boy laughing?--You think he's all fun; But the angels laugh, too, at the good he has done; The children laugh loud as they troop to his call, And the poor man that knows him laughs loudest of all!

Yes, we 're boys,--always playing with tongue or with pen,-- And I sometimes have asked,--Shall we ever be men?

Shall we always be youthful, and laughing, and gay, Till the last dear companion drops smiling away?

Then here's to our boyhood, its gold and its gray!

The stars of its winter, the dews of its May!

And when we have done with our life-lasting toys, Dear Father, take care of thy children, THE BOYS!

LINES

1860

I 'm ashamed,--that 's the fact,--it 's a pitiful case,-- Won't any kind cla.s.smate get up in my place?

Just remember how often I've risen before,-- I blush as I straighten my legs on the floor!

There are stories, once pleasing, too many times told,-- There are beauties once charming, too fearfully old,-- There are voices we've heard till we know them so well, Though they talked for an hour they'd have nothing to tell.

Yet, Cla.s.smates! Friends! Brothers! Dear blessed old boys!

Made one by a lifetime of sorrows and joys, What lips have such sounds as the poorest of these, Though honeyed, like Plato's, by musical bees?

What voice is so sweet and what greeting so dear As the simple, warm welcome that waits for us here?

The love of our boyhood still breathes in its tone, And our hearts throb the answer, "He's one of our own!"

Nay! count not our numbers; some sixty we know, But these are above, and those under the snow; And thoughts are still mingled wherever we meet For those we remember with those that we greet.

We have rolled on life's journey,--how fast and how far!

One round of humanity's many-wheeled car, But up-hill and down-hill, through rattle and rub, Old, true Twenty-niners! we've stuck to our hub!

While a brain lives to think, or a bosom to feel, We will cling to it still like the spokes of a wheel!

And age, as it chills us, shall fasten the tire That youth fitted round in his circle of fire!