Ella Wheeler Wilcox

“ Thou wilt lean down, but cannot clasp or kiss me.
How strange it is, that I, so loving thee,
And knowing we must part, perchance to-morrow,
Do comfort find, thinking how great will be
Thy lonely desolation, and thy sorrow.
And stranger—sadder, O mine own other part,
That I should grudge thee some surcease of weeping;
Why do I not rejoice, that in thy heart,
Sweet love will bloom again when I am sleeping?
Nay, make no promise. I would place no bar
Upon thy future, even wouldst thou let me.
Thou hast, thou dost, well love me, like a man:
And, like a man, in time thou wilt forget me. ”

“ I woke in tears; but lo! a moment after,
When every vestige of my dream was fled,
I broke the silence of my room with laughter,
To think sleep had revived a thing so dead.
Thank God, that only in the realms of fancy
Can that old sorrow wake again to strife.
No fate is strong enough—no necromancy—
To make it stir one pulse of my calm life.
My heart is light, my lot is blest without you,
Our early sorrows are not what they seem,
Now in my slumber, if I dream about you
I wake to laugh at such an idle dream. ”

“ Will smile like the stars on me.
I sweep down the stair, a bride most fair,
And some one takes my hand.
I am numb and cold, but the lie is told,
I smile and my lord is bland.
But oh! for a sight of my rover wild,
Who wanders abroad in the land.
I am queen of the ball and the festal hall;
I have beauty and youth and gold,
Men bow at the shrine of this lord of mine—
Lord of his sums untold.
But oh! to be off in the wilds to-night
With my lover brave and bold.
I dream a dream while the candles gleam,
While the dancers merrily glide. ”

“ To caw of crows, or to the vulture’s screech.
Love is a feast; and if the guests divide
With all who pass, though thousands swell the van,
There shall be food and drink for every man;
The loaves and fishes will be multiplied.
Love is the guide. I look to heights above
So beautiful, so very far away;
Yet I shall tread their sunlit peaks some day,
Since close in mine I hold the hand of love.
Love is the law. But yield to its control
And thou shalt find all things work for the best,
And in the calm, still heaven of thy breast,
That God, Himself, sits talking with thy soul. ”

“ I woke from my dream in the black midnight—
It was only a dream at worst or best—
But I lay and thought till the dawn of light,
Had the dream been true we had both been blest.
Better to kneel by your still dead form,
With my cheek on your breast, and die that way,
Than to live and battle with night and storm,
And drift away from you day by day.
Better the anguish of death and loss,
The sharp, quick pain, and the darkness, then,
Than living on with this heavy cross
To bear about in the world of men. ”

“ And hope wakes ever with Springtime’s calling.
With Springtime’s calling the pulses thrill;
And the heart is tuned to a sweeter measure.
For never a green Spring crossed the hill
That came not laden with some new pleasure.
Some new pleasure that brings content;
And the heart looks up with a smile of gladness,
And wonders idly when sorrow went
Out of the life that seemed all sadness.
That seemed all sadness, and yet grew bright
With colours we thought could tinge it never.
Yet I think the pain though out of sight,
Like the warp of the carpet, is there for ever. ”

“ Since I know that it runs away from thee,
I give it little heed.
It does not matter if in calm or strife,
There ebb or flow for me the future’s tide.
I had but one great longing in my life,
And that has been denied.
It does not matter if I stand or fall,
Or walk with kings, or with the rank and file;
Life’s loftiest aims and best ambitions all
Were centred in thy smile.
It does not matter what the world may say:
I feel no interest in its blame or praise.
I only know we dwell apart to-day,
And shall through endless days. ”

“ I, who have sold the birthright of sweet tears,
And no more feel a thrill in pulse or brain,
Would gladly have exchanged my tasteless years
For one salt hour of pain.
Weep on, ye mourners. Glory in the cross
Of some great grief. Thank God you do not know
The greater grief that comes but with the loss
Of power to suffer woe.
RONDEAU
As you forgot I may forget,
When summer dews cease to be wet.
When whippoorwills disdain the night,
When sun and moon are no more bright,
And all the stars at midnight set. ”

“ It sees through the warp that the Spring is filling,
The black threads twining in under it all.
Go back, O spring! till pain, forsaking
These haunts of sorrow, shall sink to rest.
Go back! go back! for my heart is breaking,
And the same old anguish hurts my breast.
WHY I LOVE HER
Why do I love my sweetheart? Well
I really never tried to tell.
I love her mayhap for her smile,
So innocent and free from guile. ”

“ We did not dream then of this hour,
This sad, sad hour for you and me;
We did not dream there was a power
Could force us for eternity
To say Good night.
Good night—nay, turn your eyes away;
I cannot bear their tender light.
Now evermore to golden day,
To golden hope, a last Good night,
Good night—Good night.
NO PLACE
When days grow long, and brain and hands grow weary,
And hot the city street,
Forth to the haunts, by cooling winds made cheery
We fly with willing feet. ”

“ The dream was brief, and beautiful, and tender,
(O God! to live those golden hours once more.
The silver moonlight, and his dark eyes’ splendour,
The sky above us, and the sea before.)
Come, come, Lisette, bring out those royal laces;
To-night must make the victory complete.
Among the crowd of masked and smiling faces,
I’ll move with laughter, and with smiles most sweet.
Make me most fair! with youth and grace and beauty,
I needs must conquer bloated age and gold. ”

“ I have battled hour by hour;
But the fates have willed that the strife is vain.
Alone in the hour my thoughts have reign,
And I yield myself to their power.
Yield myself to the old time charm
Of a dream of vanished bliss,
The thrill of a voice, and the fold of an arm,
And a red lip’s lingering kiss.
It all comes back like a flowing tide ”

“ I would go further on.’
‘There lies,’ said Genius, ‘up on yonder peak
A Prize, alone, I have not cared to seek.’
Up, up they went—as swift, as sure as Time,
They seemed to soar: (in truth they did but climb) ,
And there in sight of all the world beneath—
Ambition crowned fair Genius with a wreath.
All day they journeyed, swift from place to place;
Ambition led, and Genius joined the chase.
In every realm of fancy, or of thought,
All depths they sounded, and all heights they sought. ”

“ Why, need I tell thee what its shape or name?
Thou hast thy secret hidden from the light:
And be it sin or sorrow, woe or shame,
Thou dost not like to meet it in the night.
And yet it comes. As certainly as death,
And far more cruel since death ends all pain,
On lonesome nights we feel its icy breath,
And turn and face the thing we fancied slain.
With shrinking hearts, we view the ghastly shape;
We look into its eyes with fear and dread,
And know that we can never more escape
Until the grave doth fold us with the dead. ”

“ For up in my breast there rose supreme
A strong man’s heart, and all on fire:
Drunk with the wine of a wild, sweet dream,
And tortured with desire.
It is tossed with hope, and fear, and doubt,
It is mad with the fever of love’s unrest,
I wish to God I could pluck it out—
This heart I found in my breast.
A MAN’S REVERIE
How cold the old porch seems. A dreary chill
Creeps upward from the river at twilight,
And yet, I like to linger here at night,
And dream the summer tarries with us still.
The summer and the summer guests, or guest.
(Men rarely dream in plurals.) ”

“ Whose high-strung souls are ardent and intense.
But having seen all depths and scaled all heights,
Having a heart love thrilled, and sorrow wrung,
Knowing all pains, all pleasures, all delights,
Now I would die—but cannot, being young.
Nothing is left me, but supreme despair;
The bitter dregs that tell of wasted wine.
Come furrowed brow, dull eye, and frosted hair,
Companions fit for this old heart of mine.
WARP AND WOOF
Through the sunshine, and through the rain
Of these changing days of mist and splendour,
I see the face of a year-old pain
Looking at me with a smile half tender. ”

“ Ah, Geraldine! my lady of sweet arts,
There waits for thee not very far away, a day
When thou shalt waken out of tranquil sleep, and weep
Such bitter tears as spring from anguished hearts.
Thou shalt look in thy mirror with dismay
To find upon each feature of thy face, the trace
Of time, the lover who shall follow thee, and see
Thy rare youth slipping suddenly away.
So self-assured, so certain of thy power,
It shall come on thee with a swift surprise. Thine eyes
Appalled, shall fall upon each certain, strange, sad change,
And rob thee of thy triumph in an hour. ”

“ Yet, Lord, I feel my need of Thee is doubled;
Come nearer to me in this blaze of light;
The night must fall,—the storm will burst at length.
Oh! give me strength.
So well, so well, I know the treacherous seeming
Of days like this; they are too heavenly fair.
Those waves that laugh like happy children dreaming,
Are mighty forces brewing some despair
For thoughtless hearts, and ere the hour of need,
Let mine take heed.
Joy cannot last; it must give place to sorrow
As certainly as solar systems roll. ”

“ And tears would wash the wound, I have no doubt,
If I could only weep.
Maybe my pulse would leap,
And bring one thrill back, of a vanished day,
Instead of throbbing in this dull, dead way,
If I could only weep.
O silent Fates who steep
Nectar or gall for us through all the years,
Take what thou wilt, but give me back my tears,
And let me weep and weep.
WHY SHOULD WE SIGH
Why should we sigh o’er a summer that’s dead—
Let us think of the summer to be.
It always better to look ahead,
For the rose will come again just as red
And just as fair to see. ”

“ Come nearer yet, I have no strength to reach Thee;
My soul is like a bird with broken wings.
Lean down from Thy fair height of peace, and teach me
The balm Thy touch to mortal bruises brings.
Lean down, O God, lean down!
Come near, and yet if those eternal places
Hold greater tasks to occupy Thy hands,
Send Thy blest angels whose celestial faces
Smile sometimes on us from the spirit lands. ”

“ No prayers were uttered and no tears were shed—
I only turned a picture to the wall.
A picture that had hung within my room
For years and years; a relic of my youth.
It kept the rose of love in constant bloom
To see those eyes of earnestness and truth.
At hours wherein no other dared intrude,
I had drawn comfort from its smiling grace.
Silent companion of my solitude,
My soul held sweet communion with that face.
I lived again the dream so bright, so brief,
Though wakened as we all are by some Fate ”

“ With constant yearning and fervent desire,
If your wish soars upward on wings so strong
That they never grow languid and never tire,—
Why, over the storm clouds and out of the dark
It shall come flying some day to you.
As the dove with the olive branch flew to the ark,
And the dream you have cherished—it shall come true. ”

“ The earth is green and the skies are blue;
But where is the lilt of the olden time,
When life was a melody set to rhyme,
And dreams were so real they all seemed true?
There is sun on the meadow, and blooms on the bushes,
And never a bird but is mad with glee ”

“ And you weep sweet tears o’er them.
Dry eyed I sit and look
On a withered and broken stem.
And now that all is told,
Which is the sadder, pray,
To give up your dream with its gold,
Or to see it fade into grey?
LOVE’S BURIAL
See him quake and see him tremble,
See him gasp for breath.
Nay, dear, he does not dissemble,
This is really Death.
He is weak, and worn, and wasted,
Bear him to his bier.
All there is of life he’s tasted—
He has lived a year.
He has passed his day of glory,
All his blood is cold,
He is wrinkled, thin, and hoary,
He is very old. ”

“ That, even in sleep, my dreaming fancy sings.
Sometimes when seeing snow-white clouds at noon,
Or watching silver shadows from the moon,
Within my soul has stirred a joy like fear,
As if some kindred spirit lingered near.
Come closer, Angels! thou whose haloed wings
Do gild for me the meanest ways and things,
With beauty borrowed from the Infinite—
Stand forth, let me behold thee in the light.
O thought supreme! O death! O life! ”

“ When winds of March by the springtime bidden
Over the great earth race and shout,
Forth from my breast where it long hath hidden
My same old sorrow comes creeping out.
I think each winter—its life is ended,
For it makes no stir while the snows lie deep. ”

“ And die at the grey rocks’ feet.
It wearies of life and it sickens of strife
And yet it tires of rest.
Oh! I know not why it should ache and cry—
’Tis a troublesome heart at best.
Though not understood, I think it a good
And God-like discontent.
It springs from the soul that longs for its goal—
For the source from which it was sent.
Then surge, O breast, with thy wild unrest—
Cry, heart, like a child at night,
Till the mystic shore of the Evermore
Shall dawn on thy eager sight.
A DREAM
In the night I dreamed that you had died,
And I thought you lay in your winding sheet ”