Clinton Scollard

“ While o’er a lonely fell there burns
One white vespernal star.
[p 28]
RAHINANE
Wrapt in mist and washed with rain
Is the hill of Rahinane;
Compassed by the hosts of sleep
Is its keep.
Only shadows come and go;
Only wraiths flit to and fro;
And the bat, grotesque and blind,
And the wind.
Just a shard of shattered hope
On a barren Kerry slope;
Just a ruin in the rain,
Rahinane!
[p 29]
THE WIND OF MOURNE
The wind of Mourne comes over the hill,
Over the hill with a trill of song,
And the word of the wind sets my heart athrill,—
“Though life is brief, yet love is long!” ”

“ THE TIDES Through rush and reed The long, strong tides recede, Jostle and surge, And toss and urge, And foam and merge, Where lily roots shine bright like bronzen brede. "Haste! haste!" That is their cry; Back to the mother waste They fleet, they fly, Again to be embraced— Again to be a part Of that great heart! As set the tides, so we, After the stress and roar Along life's shore, Shall one day set toward the eternal sea!
A SEA ROVER The breakers dash, the breakers boom, Upon the beaches ceaselessly ”

“ ENVOY
Spring, summer and autumn have all sped by,
(Ah, but the chill of a winter sky!)
Yet love still calls to the tryst, and now
’Tis under the green of the holly bough!
{72} Cosette’s Christmas
Cosette they called her; Cosette, that was all;
Fragile she was and flower-like, slim and tall
For her eleven years, wherein her heart
Had known but little save the world’s sharp smart.
Never her ear had heard a mother’s croon;
Never for her, about the break of June,
Had been outstretched a father’s shielding hand
To guide her woodward through the smiling land. ”

“ In the glen of Castlemaine there are eldritch tongues that call;
And the little leaves have words that will hold the heart in thrall.
In the glen of Castlemaine there ’s a glamour over all.
For the fays have cast their spell o’er the glen of Castlemaine;
There is brooding wonder there, but no dream of blight or bane;
Here, if you have loved and lost, you may find your love again!
[p 42]
SONG
Just the sun on a slope of heather,
The long blue wind and the open sea;
All the cares of the world in tether,
And nobody there but you and me! ”

“ Lord, in their dire need of Thee, Pity Thou the souls at sea! Although riven be the rail, Snapped the shroud and rent the mast, May they into harbor sail, All their perils overpast! Lord, in Thy compassion, be Pilot to the souls at sea!
WILD GEESE Along the ocean's shingly edge, Athwart the turquoise sweep of sky, The wild geese in a winged wedge Go darkling by. From far lagoons be-plumed with palm, By cove and cape, by bluff and bay, Through depths of storm, through vasts of calm, They speed their way. The pharos flashes on their flight; They do not heed its beckoning beam ”

“ Is the luring laugh of Moira when day ’s at evenfall.
I dream of the ancient wonders, of the Cross caught up in air,
Of the swan of sweet Feale Water that was a maiden fair;
I dream of the ancient wonders, but each fades in eclipse
At the lifted arms of Moira, and Moira’s lifted lips!
[p 37]
AT MONAREE
When springtime comes to Monaree I know
How the blue hyacinths blow,
And how the daffodil lights its golden glow.
These blossoms are remembrancers of those
Who lie in long repose,
Lost to our earthly scenes of joys and woes,—
The saints of other days. ”

“ Bright ’neath the Syrian sun, dim ’neath the Syrian star,
Thus lieth Galilee’s sea, sapphirine lake Gennesar;
Girdled by mountains that range purple and proud to their crests,
Bearing the burden of dreams,—glamour of eld,—on their breasts.
Just one white glint of a sail dotting the brooding expanse;
Beaches that sparkle and gleam, ripples that darkle and dance;
Grandeur and beauty and peace welded year-long into one,
Under the Syrian star, under the Syrian sun! ”

“ To tread with you where meads are green and gold,
Where upland slopes are strewn with daisy-snow,
And bee-balm torches light the flocks to fold,
And willow branches wave
Above Oriskany, singing far below
Its liquid summer stave. X
Now south we sail where stormy currents meet
Round the wind-harassed cape of Hatteras,
Beyond whose beacons, when the tides retreat,
The wide sea-mirror is like burnished glass ”

“ Below, the surge, the solemn surge, Murmured and moaned unceasingly, For all its golden past a dirge— Saint Sepulchre's beside the sea. And love and hate were here as one; Life blent with death harmoniously; 'Twas beauty in oblivion— Saint Sepulchre's beside the sea!
SEA LYRICS I We heard the breakers clash and boom; We saw them plunge and writhe and rise, And toss great flakes of ashen spume High toward the ashen skies. Out of the welter of the east One gaunt barque like a spectre bore; The mad wind trumpeted, then ceased, Then trumpeted once more. ”

“ O a song for Joyce’s Country, and the graves of the mightiest men
That ever had birth in Erin! Will their like e’er come again?
Men of the thews of titans, of the strong, unwavering hand,
Who wrested a meagre guerdon from the breast of this lean land!
[p 13]
O a song for Joyce’s Country, since it haunts one like a dream
That comes in the dusk ere dawning, ere the first bright sunrise beam;
A dream of dolor and vastness, of clouds that are swept and swirled
O’er the desolate wastes and waters of a joy-forsaken world! ”

“ Here down the live-oak aisles ’tis ours to stray
With wraiths of many a stern conquistador,
Those vanished warriors of an elder day
When gray San Marco bore the brunt of war;
Here we in revery lean
Upon the ramparts beetling o’er the bay,
And watch the shifting scene;— XII
The boats that dip and dart like living things,
Seeking the open sea beyond the bar ”

“ O great deep, Give up your host of stately presences, Adventurers and sea-heroes of old time, And let them pass before us down the day In proud procession, so that we who hear Dull bells mark off the uneventful hours May glimpse the bygone bravery of the world Now moiling in its multitudinous marts, Forgetful of fair faith and high resolve In the inglorious grapple after gold! ”

“ Of quip and toast and madrigal;
“Noel! Noel! Noel!” cry all.
And yet joy seems a thing foredone
Forevermore in every place
Beneath the red rays of the sun;—
What is Christ’s mass that wrought man grace
Without the favor of love’s face! ”

“ And so amid the deep sea din, And so amid the wastes of foam, Afar his heart was happy in His highland home!
THE WIND AND THE SEA Never the long wind dieth, Never, never, But sigheth, crieth, In its old endeavor, Where the shifting sand and shingle Meet and mingle, And the lifting land and the surge of the waters sever! Never the long wind faileth. ”

“ A KERRY DAY
Under the sweep of a fell the smoke-reek curls and drifts
Where a white-walled cottage stands nestling amid the green;
Kerry skies above arched with their azure rifts
Where a glint of sun peeps through to brighten the peaceful scene.
Cattle stand at graze, and there are the piles of peat,
And there is the swift Feale Water rimpling, dimpling away ”

“ The throng swept by, and caught her in its swirl;
There was no lip to soothe the sobbing girl,
No kindliness to aid her. A great fear
Clutched at her breast; she knew the stabbing jeer,
The pitiless blows that waited her when she
Told the ill outcome of her errandry.
Then through her brain there flashed a sudden word
That in the hive-like purlieus she had heard,
And filled her mind with sunshine. No affright
Touched her with chill at thought of death’s dim night,
For she recalled how once the preacher said
That in white lily-gardens walk the dead. ”

“ There are pleasures that glint and gleam,
And sorrows in drugget gray.
For some, with his infinite grace,
Love waits when the portal jars;
For some, with his sphinx-like face,
Death stands when the door unbars. ”

“ When dusk droops dark o'er life's uncertain seas, Closing our day, deep-shadowing the sun, And we go forth across death's pathless foam, May we have stars more stedfast e'en than these,— Burning above, for us to gaze upon, Both light and guide on the long journey home. ”

“ That I was King in Kerry, and you were Galway’s Queen!
[p 51]
A KERRY LAD
There ’s a Kerry lad a-wandering across the dipping sea,
A Kerry lad a-wandering the foam,
And oh, the swelling joy of it, the joy that there will be
When that wandering Kerry lad comes home!
There ’ll be glad voices calling him, glad voices in the street,
And hands to clasp the hands of the gossoon;
There ’ll be soft winds a-whispering above the fields of peat,
And little birds a-carolling in tune! ”

“ Of the floss of the moon in the dusk watches won,
And the lake is a-shimmer below.
There ’s a garden that ’s fair, be it day, be it night,
A garden in Kerry I know,
And never an orient dream of delight
Can match with this garden so sweet to my sight,
For here is heart’s home to a wandering wight,—
It calls me wherever I go!
[p 55]
DOWN IN KERRY
Down in Kerry maids are merry,
Down in Kerry maids are fair;
Laughin’ eyes an’ lips o’ cherry
From Feale Water to Kenmare!
Sunny weather in the heather,
Sunny weather everywhere,
Be but man an’ maid together
From Feale Water to Kenmare! ”

“ Piercing the mists of time, we gaze
Adown the future’s opening ways,
And hear the swelling prayer and praise.
Piercing the mists of time, we hail
The day when woe and sin shall fail,
And over all His love prevail. ”

“ DUSK AT SEA Dusk, like a moth of violet wing, descends Upon the beryl bosom of the sea, And in the sky's serene immensity, Where the impalpable rose of sunset blends With pearl and purple, shine the sailor's friends, God's blessed beacons twinkling timorously, Then brighter, each in its divine degree, To where the enrapt range of vision ends. ”

“ The star-sown hours beneath the Cambridge trees,
When o’er us wheeled the bright processional
Of bold Orion and the Pleiades,
And how we strolled along
Laughterful, and oblivious to all
Save the sweet thrall of Song. IV
Youth has its visions and its fervors ”

“ Cry ‘Noel!’ cry ‘Noel!’ down all the halls of Yule!
{18} Yule at Thengelfor
It was Yule at Thengelfor,—
The sharp white tide of Yule;
And the mailèd Thanes of War,
Bred in the fiery school
Of the devotees of Thor,
Flung into the council-hall
With sneer and clamorous call
At the calm-browed Thanes of Peace
Who worshiped without cease,—
Bending in prayer the knee
To the One of Galilee
Who died, as they said, for all.
Each man stood in his place
That sharp white noon of Yule,
And the War-Thanes hooted “fool,”
And “coward” and “craven knave;” ”

“ Reason,—away with it! Men have grown gray with it,
Pondering why and considering how;
We have no part in it,—nay, and no heart in it!—
Under the droop of the mistletoe bough!
So, lads, your choices all! Lift, maids, your voices all!
Love levels prince with the man at the plough. ”

“ And the breakers' loud refrain Gives the shuddering heart no peace. Lord of all the things that be, Pity Thou the souls at sea! Snugly roofed with warmth and glow, And encompassed soft by sleep, Little we land-dwellers know Of the terrors of the deep. Lord, in Thy sweet charity, Pity Thou the souls at sea! ”

“ The monks of old with prayer and hymn
Hewed out the weary “Way of the Cross.”
Gone are these holy toilers—gone;
They rest now in their long repose,
From the red dusk to the red dawn,
’Neath the sea-pinks and tangled rose.
But sorrow bides with us and ill,
And stress and sacrifice and loss,
And we must strive to meet them still
Climbing the weary “Way of the Cross.”
[p 20]
THE ISLE OF DOOM
Out of the mist off Galway shore,
Out of the morning mist,
Rose the island of Hy Brasail
With its crags of amethyst ”

“ Now the waves Lap languorously along the foamless sand, And till the far horizon swims in mist. Out of this murk, across this oily sweep, Might lost armadas grandly sail to shore; Jason might oar on Argo, or the stern Surge-wanderer from Ithaca's bleak isle Break on the sight, or Viking prows appear, And still not waken wonder. Aye, the sound Of siren singing might drift o'er the main, And yet not fall upon amazèd ears! The soul is ripe for marvels. ”

“ Spake in no uncertain speech,
Saying, “In a manger lies
One who God to man shall teach;{39}
One who shall the night o’erthrow,
Bearing heaven with Him below,—
Love that triumphs over hate,
Peace and joy that conquer woe.” ”

“ I seek my sweet where the roses stir,
And the stars overhead are a marching throng,
And this is the tale that I tell to her,—
“Though life is brief, yet love is long!”
[p 30]
MAN AND MAID
“I know a lad in Leitrim, I know a lad,” said she,
“I know a lad in Leitrim would give his heart for me!”
“I know a maid in Mayo, I know a maid,” said he,
“I know a maid in Mayo would give her heart to me!”
“Go to your maid in Mayo, go to your maid,” cried she;
“Go to your maid in Mayo, for all—for all of me!” ”

“ A SAILOR AMID THE HILLS What does he hear in dreams? The surging wind, Its long-drawn cadence, its wild harmony, A mighty harp of infinite strings designed, Whose sound to him seems sweet immeasurably? ”

“ There strayed down the path from the top of the pass
Such a slim little, prim little, trim little lass.
“Oho!” then quoth I, and “aha!” murmured she,
With as pretty a curtsy as ever you ’d see;
“Won’t you pause?” I inquired; “I don’t mind,” said her mien,
So we looked, side by side, from the Bridge of Luckeen.
How the minutes flew by, an’ the stream how it flowed,
While never a soul came along by the road;
An’ I thought her eyes sweeter than Maeve ever knew,
An’ she deemed me far bolder than Brian Boru! ”

“ Be the love about your hearth!
Leafy green, leafy green,
Be perennial your mirth!
Sturdy as a holly bole be your footing of the earth!
These white spirits of old Yule,
Happy you who hear their tune!
Joy with you shall rule,
Life for you shall be a boon
Round the year through all the watches of the moon!
{9} The Christmas Angel
In middle heaven a form behold ”