Dora Sigerson Shorter

“ From hatred have you sprung, and in the home of hatred have you been reared; harsh tongues have clashed their discords around you, and hard glances fenced above your head; we have fought over you as wolves quarrel over a bone. What can save you from coming unhappiness? What disposition can you bring into the future from this home that is killing your child soul? What do you inherit from us to enable you to find joy? Your father's evil passions, his love of wine, and my evil thoughts in you?
A man and his wife must be all to one another or nothing—there is no middle course. ”

“ The Prince of Breffni suspects that his wife Dearvorgil has a lover.⁠It is the Prince of Breffni rides quick in the pale of suspects day,
Deep in his eyes a shadow, a frown on his forehead lay;
And spur and bit not sparing, he rests nor horse nor page,
But rides into his castle like a man who wins a wage.
And up the twisting staircase, into his lady's room.
He strides with frowning forehead, like a man to meet his doom,
But from his lady's chamber he comes with sobbing breath.
With a joy upon his white lips, like a man escaped from death. ”

“ When the winds are out and calling to this vagrant heart of mine.
Whisht! it whistles at the windows, and how can I be still?
There! the last leaves of the beech-tree go dancing down the hill.
All the boats at anchor they are plunging to be free—
O to be a sailor, and away across the sea!
When the sky is black with thunder, and the sea is white with foam,
The gray-gulls whirl up shrieking and seek their rocky home,
Low his boat is lying leeward, how she runs upon the gale,
As she rises with the billows, nor shakes her dripping sail. ”

“ Down the path, with song and laughter, came three maidens hand in hand,
By their side a shadow glided that I could not understand:
For I scarce could see it coming, yet I knew that it was there,
Like a cloud upon the brightness of a sky that was all fair—
Maids more beauteous than the blossoms of the flowers which deck the lea,
Maids more joyous than the happy birds that flit from tree to tree.
‘Tell me who thou art,’ I pleaded, ‘thou with eyes of peace and love?’
‘I am Hope,’ she softly whispered, pointing with white hand above. ”

“ From the sobbing breath that a strong man drew—
When sudden there broke a fearful cry
That seemed to quiver across the sky,
A cry of some soul, it was to those
Who heard it, a soul in life's last throes,
A cold, passing breath from death's black wings,
A crash of discord o'er broken strings;
And what had been was now no more.
Silence and death seemed to cloud them o'er;
The past, the present, all men may see,
But no man knoweth what is to be.
Again they start with a new surprise,
No minstrel is there to their wildered eyes ”

“ How all the small folk hated you, big John!
As you grew fat their little pastures on;
And yet they quailed before you, or your state,
And walked behind you—all save little Kate!
She could not tame you with her gentle ways
Yet her right anger filled you with amaze.
When she would face you, giving jeer for jeer,
You struck her down, and laughed to see her tear.
With her great heart for pity not too strong,
Yet not too weak for anger at the wrong
You loved to plague her with, as when a child
You gave her grief if e'er you thought she smiled. ”

“ When will you come home, wild geese, with your thousand strong?
(The wolf-dog loud in the silence of night howls on.)
Not the fierce wind can stay your return or tumultuous sea,
for the freedom France gives to your feet on her luxuriant shore.
No smiles for your love like the tears of your sorrowing land,
Only Death in his reaping could make you return no more.
White birds, white birds, I dream of that glad homecoming;
Though human eyes could not mark your silent flight,
Women lie face down with clenched hands in the sea. ”

“ Mountains and vales, how ye quake 'neath His tread—
Wake from your slumbers, He calls, O ye dead!
Tremble, great trees, bowing down 'neath His breath;
Lay by thy scythe, at His bidding. King Death!
The sun in the heavens grows pale at His wrath.
And the stars, at a glance, disappear from their path.
God, at Thy feet, then, awe-stricken we fall—
Lord of the universe, Maker of all!
Earth's secret treasures lie bare to Thy sight,
Nor hidden from Thee the dark deeds of the night;
The lion grows timid, fawns low at Thy feet ”

“ Nor the winds that blow you backward from the path you wish to go?
Would you leave your world of passion for a home that knows no riot?
Would I change my vagrant longings for a heart more full of quiet?
No!—for all its dangers, there is joy in danger too:
On, bird, and fight your tempests, and this nomad heart with you!
The seas that shake and thunder will close our mouths one day,
The storms that shriek and whistle will blow our breaths away.
The dust that flies and whitens will mark not where we trod.
What matters then our judging? we are face to face with God. ”

“ Not yours, weak Muse, to mimic that far voice,
⁠With halting tongue;
No peace, sweet land, to bid my heart rejoice
⁠Your groves among.
Whose is the loveliness I know is by,
⁠Yet cannot place?
Is it perfection of the sea or sky,
⁠Or human face?
Not yours, my pencil, to delineate
⁠The splendid smile!
Blind in the sun, we struggle on with Fate
⁠That glows the while. ”

“ Leaving nought to inheritance, will-power, or surroundings of man.
He is dead, mother, dead; I his friend might have made his earth fair,
But I crept like a scorpion to sting all his hopes to despair:
Robbed his body of this world's joys, and his soul of the hope
Of that other that sings through the air at the pull of the rope,
Till my mad passion swells at the tongues of the bells.”
“Hush thee and listen, my son, my son, for the bells are the voice of love.”
(All the things He made live can their Father forgive.)
“O mother! a sinner's cry may be heard above. ”

“ What have the tossing waves found for their play?
Have mercy, let the white face hide away!
In the fields a harvest dead,
In the woods life’s promise fled,
⁠And the lark is blown seaward as he sings.
Far better you were sleeping, O my soul.
Than that your coming forth a moment stole
From another’s heart its rest.
Die you silent in my breast
⁠And seek in death that answer life denied:
Lest a dying voice should curse instead of pray,
Lest a heart should shadow, blighted of its May,
Lest a soul glad of its light
Should be plunged in gloom of night. ”

“ He felt shy of her, as though he did not know her.
"You are a stranger," he said, dropping her hands.
The girl was wounded. "Father!" she said, and could say no more. She could have told his every movement—every wrinkle that the years had added, every new tress of white that came among his brown hair. She knew his step along the road before she saw him. She could almost tell how he looked at every hour of the day, what his rare smile was like, and what the habitual frown that sorrow had laid upon his forehead. ”

“ For ruin fell upon her house and I was full of fear.
I saw wild fury seize her home, I heard a red wind scream,
I saw the groaning roof- tree fall, the flame on wall and beam.
I fell upon the broken way, struck down by chill despair:
“My life's long love, my only joy, my dear beyond compare,
A thousand souls will bleed with mine, a thousand hearts expire,
To see so fair a form as thine upon a martyr's fire.” ”

“ And as she gazed a honey-bee hummed in her ear, "Go not to the great city."
And as she smiled she raised her hand between her eyes and the far-off towers so she could not see.
"Nay," quoth she, "it is a small place; my hand can cover it."
"Ring a chime," saith she to the heather shaking its bells in the wind, "ring for me a wedding chime, for I am to be the bride of the Earl Roderick."
She kissed the wild bramble lifting its petals in the sun. ”

“ A shot, a cry, a struggle, and a fainting woman's kiss;
Life's blood let 'mid the grasses—and all a world was lost,
And no one may ever know how he paid the cost.
He is lost in the crowd of the dead, in the night-time of death,
A name on a stone left to tell that he ever drew breath.
So desperate body die there, with your soul's long release,
And, unhappy spirit, God grant you Eternity's peace! ”

“ Brush past my soul impatiently;
I saw the bloom on flower and tree
That only grows beyond the sea.
Methought the distant voices spake
More wisdom than near tongues can make;
I followed—lest my heart should break.
And what is past is past and done.
I dreamt, and here the dream begun:
I saw a salmon in the sun
Leap from the river to the shore—
Ah! strange mishap, so wounded sore,
To his sweet stream to turn no more.
A bird from ’neath his mother’s breast,
Spread his weak wings in vain request ”

“ Then the dim lips of the shadow moved—I heard a faint voice call:
‘On! on! Time must never linger; Death, the king, is end of all.’
So along the path we wandered—oh! the bliss of those short hours!
Youth and Hope and Joy together 'mid the everblooming flowers
That on life's smooth path were glowing soft beneath my naked feet,
Till I envied nought in Heaven, thinking here my lot complete.
As I raised the flowering branches that across my path would stray,
Lo! I found amidst the blossoms at my feet Love sleeping lay. ”

“ I slew a young bird at her feet, and she spake no word, nor did she care."
"It is not she," said a linnet, swaying on a safe spray, "for had it been she her anger would have slain thee."
"It is she," said the red weasel, laughing in his throat; "but her eyes are hidden by her fingers, and she cannot see."
"It is not she," said a brown wren. "Her cheek was full and rosy and her song loud. This one sitteth all mute and pale."
"It is she," said the red weasel, "who sitteth upon the mountain, her face hidden between her hands. She sitteth in silence, and who can tell her thoughts? ”

“ She will tell sweet dreams to my king, for I see she whispers to him already: his eyes open once, and then shut in deep, happy slumber.
Who in the night has not woke with an exceedingly bitter cry for something that they have not got? but who has cried as I have, breaking the silence? Oh, little child of hate, sleeping beside me, why have I borne you? Why have I cursed you with the heritage that must be yours? Little bond of love that keeps together two hearts that else would spring asunder, you must pay in sorrow for our sins! ”

“ Without hope of gain, without hope of honour, without love of life, without fear of death, who mourned for nobody, for whom nobody would mourn, she knelt in the streets in the danger zone and prayed for the success of the revolution.
With the fire in her old veins revived, with the patriotic heart, she, too, held her place in the ranks, hearing the wonderful call that had come to her countrymen. When all seemed quenched of youth and young heroic dreams, poor and nameless, she threw off the rags that poverty held about her and was beautiful in the tricolour of faith, hope, and love. ”

“ My soul is crying for a dead soldier.
“Kneel ye down, lest your eyes should dare them,
Kneel ye down and your beads be saying.”
“Lord, on their heads Thy wrath deliver,”
This is the prayer that my lips are praying,
My heart is praying for a dead soldier.
“Best cheer the path of the men victorious,
For he is dead and his blade lies broken,
His march is far where no aid can follow,
And for his people he left no token,
He left no token, the dead soldier.”
The way of the sword a man can follow,
See the young child with his gold hair gleaming. ”

“ Made so we count and see a cycle of Eternity.
How long wilt thou love me, O beloved?
“So long shall I love thee, O my love!
As long as tears may be.”
Tears may turn to laughter
In the long Hereafter.
Laughter to tears for me, as is in our God's decree.
How long wilt thou love me, O beloved?
“So long shall I love thee, O my love!
As long as love may be,
Love that can courage give
To the faint heart to live.
To the faint heart Death to see, love that is Eternity,
So long shall I love thee, O my love!” ”

“ WHEN SUMMER COMES
When summer comes, then you are near to me,
⁠I feel your phantom presence on my heart,
In every wind the dead year speaks again,
⁠And every scene springs up to take its part.
'Twas such a day, as sweet a wind arose.
⁠To kiss with perfumed Ups your brown blown hair;
With brow perplexed and that odd smile you had,
⁠I wondered what you thought of, standing there. ”

“ Gone, all are gone, they neither hear or care,
The sun shines on and life is ever fair.
They shun the struggle, laughter lurks elsewhere.
The ship is sinking, passing echoes cry,
“Stand by!”
The little ships that pass her in the night,
Speed from the darkness in their eager fright.
From troubled dreams they take refuge in flight.
Why should they then, who know they too must die,
“Standby”?
Then get you gone, desert the sinking ship,
O faithless friends, who on her pleasure-trip
Clung close with gentle words and smiling lip,
And still as ever on your own joys cry,
“Stand by!” ”

“ A ghostly moon in a steel cold sky,
A dance of leaves by the wind swept by,
Like the mirthless rushing of phantom feet.
But the Lady Kathleen murmured: “Sweet!
Love keeps a woman's summer young.”
She sped without fear in the awe of night,
Though the shuddering shadows would stay her flight
With the thought of a horror unknown,
Or a streamlet would laugh 'neath the hedge unshown
But the Lady Kathleen wept no more :
“Oh, joy is mine, for my trial's o'er!” ”

“ Give wine for its hot veins, fame for its throne, and laughter for its lips,
All ends in one eclipse.
Sunshine or snows.
We gain a grave, and afterwards—God knows.
Bemoan beside your fire your own particular fate, that evil wind
That blows for you no mercy, think till the wearied mind
Doth ease itself in tears, or reason from her high throne slips,
So ends life in eclipse,
However the wind blows,
We gain a grave, and afterwards—God knows. ”

“ I feel the air move as though fanned by invisible wings. Angels wait to bear my child to heaven; but for me dread ghosts are lurking in the darkness, and I am afraid. I feel what I cannot see; their blazing eyes burn into my soul. If I were sure that when among the damned I should remember that my child was safe in heaven, I could find the sacrifice of my eternal life more easy to bear; but perhaps I may not remember. I do not think I shall, for then it would not be hell. What if they torture me with false dreams, making me see him in misery and misfortune? ”

“ Now, no toil in the great halls of the evil one could have been more bitter to endure than to unbar the door for the lost souls; for her sweet tenderness was tortured most of all by the despairing ghosts that passed to their eternal perdition, and her hands felt guilty at letting them go through.
But of all the sorrows none was so great as for her eyes to see the tortures of Black Roderick, who stood beside her in his anguish, for the tears that fell upon him from her eyes gave him no relief, since he had injured her on earth. ”