“ But linger who will in the lure of a southerly smile,
Here is my heart.
Wrought to a mutual blueness are mountains and sky,
Intermingling they meet;
Little gray breathings of olive arise from the plain
Like sighs that are seen,
For man and his Maker harmonious toil, and the sigh
Of such labor is sweet,
And the fruits of their patience are vistas of vineyards and grain
In a glory of green.
26
No wind from the valley that passes the casement but flings
Invisible flowers. ”

“ The medium of magazine publication, towards which some critics, and some poets too (a fact which can hardly be justified) , and a considerable portion of the reading public have a disparaging opinion, is deserving of better repute for the general high quality of poetic art that is published. Not many years ago it was a favorite exercise of the reviewer, when noticing the average book of verse which happened to include selections reprinted from various magazines, to term the work “magazinable,” or the poet a “magazine poet.” ”

“ The poetry of the year in volumes has not been as ample as last year. The three poets who have aroused most discussion are the Bengali poet Tagore, who brought to the Western world in “Gitanjali” a spiritual message full of mystic but exalted idealism; Francis Thompson, the great Catholic poet, because of the publication of his collected works; and Robert Bridges, who, by his appointment to the English laureateship, became known to a large number of readers who had hitherto been unfamiliar with his very perfect and delicate gift of lyric beauty. ”

“ So when another year passes and we sum up our achievements, there is no achievement more vital in registering the soul of a people than its poetry. But in all things that men do, their relationship is objective except those things in which art, religion, love, and nature express their influence through the private thoughts and feelings of men. ”

“ I want to call attention to a poet who has not yet presented himself except through an occasional magazine piece, but who has written two of the finest sonnets in American poetry. Last year I reprinted, in my annual summary, Mr. Mahlon Leonard Fisher’s “As an Old Mercer,” and pronounced that an achievement which could hardly be surpassed. But in the sonnet “November,” which is reprinted in this book, Mr. Fisher has done, I believe, something that is even greater. ”

“ The long poems have been well sustained, and there has been a larger quantity of pure lyric pieces than in the past two or three years. The influence of Masefield has shown itself in American verse, notably in the two long poems by Harry Kemp, “The Harvestvi Hand” and “The Factory.” One of the noblest poems of the year is Henry van Dyke’s “Daybreak in the Grand Cañon of Arizona,” which breathes a fine national spirit, full of reverence for the greatness with which the American destiny is symbolized in the natural grandeur of our country. ”

“ The most important book of poems of the year by an American poet, however, is that of Nicholas Vachel Lindsay, “General William Booth Enters into Heaven and Other Poems.” Here is a man with a big vision, with a fine originality, and an art that is particularly his own. There has been no “Lyric Year” this autumn, but a littlevii volume that serves in some sense its purpose is Miss Jessie B. Rittenhouse’s “Little Book of Modern Verse,” which is intended to represent the quality of contemporary American verse. ”

“ The Bellman Madison Cawein
7
TREES
I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the sweet earth’s hungry breast;
A tree that looks at God all day
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree!
Poetry, A Magazine of Verse Joyce Kilmer
IN THE HOSPITAL ”

“ Glints the plowshare in the brown and fragrant furrow;
Pigeons coo in shady coverts as they pair;
Come the furtive mountain folk from cave and burrow,
Lean, and blinking at the sunlight’s sudden glare.
Bright through midmost heaven moves the lesser Lion ”

“ O Yielder of All, can America worthily thank Thee till such be her yield?
In the mellowing light
Of the goldenest days that precede the gray days of the year,
We sing Thee our harvesting song and we pray Thee to hear,
In the midst of Thy might:
Labor is given to us,
Let us give thanks! ”

“ Let us see thy corn-pale hair the sunlight meshing,
When the sounding flails of autumn swing again.
Yale Review Louis V. Ledoux
OVER THE WINTRY THRESHOLD
Over the wintry threshold
Who comes with joy today,
So frail, yet so enduring,
To triumph o’er dismay?
Ah, quick her tears are springing,
And quickly they are dried,
For sorrow walks before her,
But gladness walks beside.
She comes with gusts of laughter,—
The music as of rills;
With tenderness and sweetness,
The wisdom of the hills.
Her hands are strong to comfort,
Her heart is quick to heed ”

“ The sickle is dulled of the reaping and the threshing-floor is bare;
The dust of night’s in the air. 44
The peace of the weary is ours:
All day we have taken the fruit and the grain and the seeds of the flowers. ”

“ Willard Huntington Wright, himself a poet of considerable attainment, has been the means of offering the public a high and consistent standard of excellence in the verse it printed.
To the six magazines, namely, Harper’s, Scribner’s, Century, Forum, Lippincott’s, and The Smart Set, I have added this year a weekly, The Bellman. West of New York it is the best edited and most influential periodical published. ”

“ A significant fact which the poetry in this volume must bring to the reader’s mind in considering American poetry of today is, that these selections have been published for the first time during the current year. Our poetry needs, more than anything else, encouragement and support, to reveal its qualities. The poets are doing satisfying and vitally excellent work, and it only remains for the American public to do its duty by showing a substantial appreciation. ”

“ It must rank with Lizette Woodworth Reese’s “Tears” and Longfellow’s “Nature” as the best sonnets that have been accomplished by American poets. I have known one competent judge and lover of poetry to declare that not since Keats’ “On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer” and Miss Reese’s “Tears” has there appeared so fine a sonnet in English poetry. The man who has written “November” has added something to American poetry that cannot be too highly estimated. ”

“ Unto a poet’s heart
To find that living in his breast
Which is immortal art.
The Forum George Edward Woodberry
SCHOOL I
Old Hezekiah leaned hard on his hoe
And squinted long at Eben, his lank son.
The silence shrilled with crickets. Day was done,
And, row on dusky row,
Tall bean poles ribbed with dark the gold-bright afterglow.
Eben stood staring: ever, one by one,
The tendril tops turned ashen as they flared. ”

“ Even poetsx who detested being called “minor” poets preferred that rather vague and indiscriminate distinction, rather than the unrespectable “magazinable.”
Quoting what I have written in previous years, to emphasize the methods which guided my selections, the reader will see how impartial are the tests by which the distinctive and best poems are chosen: “I have not allowed any special sympathy with the subject to influence my choice. I have taken the poet’s point of view, and accepted his value of the theme he dealt with. ”

“ If there are any others I do not know of them, and in which case I would gladly give credit, so I trust any omission of such will be charged to ignorance rather than intention. I wish it to be understood that the privilege extended me so courteously, by both the authors and the magazines, to print the poems in this volume, does not in any sense restrict the authors in their rights to print the poems in volumes of their own. ”

“ Ledoux’sxii poems, which is also to include the “Hymn to Demeter” from “A Sicilian Idyl,” they are to issue in January, under the title of “The Shadow of Ætna.” The two selections by Mr. Richard Burton, “Here Lies Pierrot” and “Human”; the two by Willard Huntington Wright, “What of the Night?” and “Later”; the one by George Edward Woodberry, “St. John and the Faun”; and the two by Richard Le Gallienne, “May is Building Her House” and “Desiderium” (which while this Introduction is being written has come out in Mr. Le Gallienne’s volume, “The Lonely Dancer and Other Poems,” John Lane Co.) ”

“ I’m tellin’ you there’s nought to fear. 51
What if the twilight’s gloomish
An’ th’ shadows creep an’ crawl?—
Woman, woman, here’ll be th’ cave!
Stand by me close till I call!
“Sin Eater! Devil Cheater!”
(Eh, it echoes hollowly!)
“Margot’s dead at Willow Farm!
Shroud your face and follow me!” III
One o’ th’ clock ... two o’ th’ clock....
This night’s a week in span!
Still he crouches by her side....
Devil ... ghost ... or man?... IV
Woman, never cock’s crow sounded sweet before!
Set the casement wide ajar, fasten back the door!
Eh, but I be cold an’ stiff, waitin’ for th’ dawn ”

“ The first test was the sense of pleasure the poem communicated; then to discover the secret or the meaning of the pleasure felt; and in doing so to realize how much richer one became in a knowledge of the purpose of life by reason of the poem’s message.”
In one hundred and twenty-one numbers of these seven magazines I find there were published during 1913 a total of 506 poems. ”

“ Since their appearance in the magazines and before the close of the year when the contents of this volume was made up, two poems herein included appeared in the original volumes of their authors. For the use of William Rose Benét’s “The Marvelous Munchausen” I have also to thank The Century Co., publishers of “Merchants of Cathay,” in which volume it appears. As far as I know, only three of the poems here included are to come out immediately in books by their authors. The last four stanzas of “A Threnody,” by Mr. ”

“ Does each play the enchanted rôle
We phantoms played? Here lies Pierrot!
O joy, that I remember yet
Sweet follies of the long ago!
Dear heaven, I would not quite forget!
The moon’s ashine; Here lies Pierrot!
Scribner’s Richard Burton
64
LIST OF “DISTINCTIVE POEMS,” THEIR AUTHORS, AND THE MAGAZINES IN WHICH THEY APPEARED Century— A Light Bearer. Marion Couthouy Smith. Unmasked. Madison Cawein. Robert Browning. Margaret Widdemer. Will’s Counsellor. Charles Wharton Stork. Song of the Open Land. Richard Burton. Along the Road. Robert Browning Hamilton. A Prayer. Louis Untermeyer. Charms. ”

“ The Mowers. D. H. Lawrence. In the Market Place. George Sterling. Winter. Sara Teasdale. The Shadow. Witter Bynner. Then and Now. Richard Burton. Song Against Women. Willard Huntington Wright. Fifty Years Spent. Maxwell Struthers Burt. Of Moira Up the Glen. Edward J. O’Brien.
THE “BEST POEMS” CHOSEN FROM THE “DISTINCTIVE” LIST A Likeness. Willa Sibert Cather. Ghosts. Marguerite Mooers Marshall. November. Mahlon Leonard Fisher. Perugia. Amelia Josephine Burr. God’s Will. Mildred Howells. The Swordless Christ. Percy Adams Hutchison. The Field of Glory. Edwin Arlington Robinson. Love of Life. ”

“ The City That Will Not Repent. Nicholas Vachel Lindsay. The Old Maid. Sara Teasdale. August— Moods at May-Dawn. John Helston. Poems. Allan Updegraff. Song Primitive. Francis Hill. Mother-Heart. Anna Spencer Twitchell. September— The Voice of the Lord. E. D. Schoonmaker. Reverie. Zoë Akins. Departure. John Hall Wheelock. A Prayer for Beauty. Witter Bynner. A City Morning. Edith Wyatt. Out from Lynn. Lewis Worthington Smith. October— School. Percy MacKaye. Prithee, Strive Not. Harry Kemp. Off Viareggio. Chester Allyn Reed. In the Maternity Ward. Florence Earle Coates. The Poet of the Slums. ”

“ Human. Richard Burton. Home-Coming. Norreys Jephson O’Conor. Breath. Witter Bynner. The Bartender. Joyce Kilmer. The Great Carousal. Louis Untermeyer. The Wine Press. Theodore Lynch FitzSimons. Without Inconstancy. Harry Kemp. Sea Longing. Sara Teasdale. The Crickets. Henry Eastman Lower. Serenade. J. W. Wood. L’Ame des Choses. Florian-Parmentier. Wail of a Waitress. Ethel M. Kelley. September— Poems. Ezra Pound. Heart of the World. Maxwell Struthers Burt. The Three Hermits. William Butler Yeats. A Woman of the Streets. ”

“ Prayers for the Living. Mary W. Plummer. The Little People. Amelia Josephine Burr. Beauty in Eden. Alfred Noyes. The High Tide at Gettysburg. Will H. Thompson. For a Blank Page. Austin Dobson. Maurice Maeterlinck. Stephen Phillips. August— A Double Star. Leroy Titus Weeks. A Message from Italy. Margaret Widdemer. The Marvelous Munchausen. ”