Edgar Lee Masters

“ So it is An American village, in a great Republic, Where men are free, where therefore goodness, wisdom Must have their way! We reach the budding age. Sweet aches are in our breasts: Is it spring, or God, or music, is it you? I am all tenderness for you at times, Then hate myself for feeling so, my flesh Crawls by an instinct from you. You repel me Sometimes with an insidious smile, a look. What are these phantasies I have? They breed Strange hatred for you, even while I feel My soul's home is with you, must be with you To find my soul's rest. ”

“ He springs renewed from a lusty bed To his youth's desire. He drowses, for April flames outspread In his soul's attire. The strength of men is for husbandry Of woman's flesh: Worker, soldier, magistrate Of city or realm; Artist, builder, wrestling Fate Lest it overwhelm The brood or the race, or the cherished state. They sing at the helm When the waters roar and the waves are great, And the gale is fresh. There are two miracles, women and men— Yea, four there be: A woman's flesh, and the strength of a man, And God's decree. And a babe from the womb in a little span Ere the month be ten. ”

“ The flesh of women is like the sky When bare is the moon: Rhythm of backs, hollow of necks, And sea-shell loins. I know a woman whose splendors vex Where the flesh joins— A slope of light and a circumflex Of clefts and coigns. She thrills like the air when silence wrecks An ended tune. These are the things not made by hands in the earth: Water and fire, The air of heaven, and springs afresh, And love's desire. And a thing not made is a woman's flesh, Sorrow and mirth! ”

“ My body is Nature and my head Is Man, and God has given me A seeing spirit, strong and free, Though by a single eye, as even Man has one vision at a time. I lift my pails up; mark them well. With this fire I will burn up heaven, And with this water I will quench The flames of hell's remotest trench, That men may work in righteousness. Not for the fears of an after hell, Nor for the rewards which heaven will bless The soul with when the mountains nod And the sun darkens, but for love Of Man and Life, and love of God. ”

“ You labor for years in trees not worth the raising. You planted what you knew not, bitter or sour for sweet. No luck more bitter than poor seed, but one as bitter: The planting of perfect seed in soil that feeds and fails, Nourishes for a little, and then goes spent forever. Look to your seed, he said, and remember the soil. And after that is the fight: the foe curled up at the root, The scale that crumples and deadens, the moth in the blossoms Becoming a life that coils at the core of a thing of beauty: You bite your apple, a worm is crushed on your tongue! ”

“ We can replant, ere frosts appear, Gather the blossoms we have sown. And I have preached that hearts should seize The hour that brings realities. ... Yes, I admit it all, we crush Under our feet the world's contempt. But when I raise the cup, it's blush Reveals the snake's eyes, there's a hush While a hand writes upon the wall: Life cannot be re-made, exempt From life that has been, something's gone Out of the soil, in life updrawn To growths that vine, and tangle, crawl, Withered in part, or gone to seed. 'Tis not the same, though you have freed The soil from what was grown. ”

“ You are so blind you cannot see us men As walking trees! I fancy from the tune You play upon the flute, you have a vision Of leafy trees along a country road-side, Where wheat is growing and the meadow-larks Rise singing in the sun-shine! In your darkness You may see such things playing on your flute Here in the granite ways of mad Chicago! And here's another on a farther corner, With head thrown back as if he searched the skies, He's selling evening papers, what's to him The flaring headlines? Yet he calls the news. That is his flute, perhaps, for one can call, Or play the flute in blindness. ”

“ And the springs march before me, say, "Behold Here are we, and what would you, can you use us? What good is air if lungs are out, or springs When the mind's flown so far away no spring, Nor loveliness of earth can call it back? I tell you what it is: in early youth The life is in the loins; by thirty years It travels through the stomach to the lungs, And then we strut and crow. By forty years The fruit is swelling while the leaves are fresh. By fifty years you're ripe, begin to rot. At fifty-two, or fifty-five or sixty The life is in the seed—what's spring to you? ”

“ His brow was like a loaf of bread, his eyes Turned from his father's blue to gray, his nose Was like his mother's, skin was dark like hers. His shapely body, hands and feet belonged To some patrician face, not to Marat's. And his was like Marat's, fanatical, Materialistic, fierce, as it might guide A reptile's crawl, but yet he crawled to peaks Loving the hues of mists, but not the mists His father loved. And being a rebel soul He thought the world all wrong. A nothingness Moving as malice marred the life of man. ”

“ You have extracted The secret in the main, that 'twas from love He came to death. His life had been too fast, His years too many for the daily rapture I gave him after three months' separation. And so he died one morning, made me free Of nothing but his presence in the flesh. His love is on me yet, and its effect. And now you're here to slave me differently— No soul is ever free.
HEAVEN IS BUT THE HOUR Eyes wide for wisdom, calm for joy or pain, Bright hair alloyed with silver, scarcely gold. And gracious lips flower pressed like buds to hold The guarded heart against excess of rain. ”

“ The quack grass of popery flourished in France, you essayed To plow up the tangle, and harrow the roots from the soil. It took a good ploughman to plow it, a ploughman of laughter, A ploughman who laughed when the plow struck the roots, and your breast Was thrown on the handles. And yet to this day, O Voltaire, They charge you with levity, scoffing, when all that you did Was to plough up the quack grass, and turn up the roots to the sun, And let the sun kill them. For laughter is sun-light, And nothing of worth or of truth needs to fear it. ”

“ As a virgin shamed By the swelling life unlicensed needles it, But empties not her womb of some last shred Of flesh which fouls the alleys of her body, And fills her wholesome nerves with poisoned sleep, And weakness to the last of life, so I For some shame not unlike, some need of life To rid me of this life I had conceived Did up and choke it too, and thence begot A fever and a fixed debility For killing that begot. Now you see that I Have not grown from a central dream, but grown Despite a wound, and over the wound and used My flesh to heal my flesh. ”

“ Breathless he lay and fearfully, While on his brain a vision shone. Said a Great Voice of sweetest tone: "The time has come when I must take The form of man for mankind's sake. This drama is played long enough By creatures who have naught of me, Save what comes up from foam of the sea To crawling moss or swimming weeds, At last to man. From heaven in flame, Pure, whole, and vital, down I fly, And take a mortal's form and name, And labor for the race's needs." Then Friar Yves dreamed the sky Flushed like a bride's face rosily, And shot to lightning from its bloom. ”

“ Like a beast They cart you off. What matter if your thought Outsoared the Phoenix? Like a beast you rot. Methinks that something wants our flesh, as we Hunger for flesh of beasts. But still to-morrow, To-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow Creeps in this petty pace—O, Michael Drayton, Some end must be. But 'twixt the fear of ceasing And weariness of going on we lie Upon these thorns! These several springs I find No new birth in the Spring. And yet in London I used to cry, "O, would I were in Stratford; It's April and the larks are singing now. ”