Madison Julius Cawein

“ Where ever the one all night is shrill,
And ever the other all day brings hours
Of glimmering silence that dead days fill.
A gray sad land, where her girlhood grew
To womanhood proud, that the hill-winds seemed
To give their heart, like melody, to;
And the stars, their soul, like a dream undreamed—
The only glad thing that the sad land knew.
[49] My Lady, you know, how nobly born!
Haughty of form, with a head that rose
Like a dream of empire; love and scorn
Made haunts of her eyes; and her lips were bows
Whence pride imperious flashed flower and thorn. ”

“ Whistling the phantom flies and fades away.
Some say there comes no stage; that Hackelnburg,
Wild-huntsman of the Harz, comes dark as storm,
With rain and wind and demon dogs of Hell,
The terror of his hunting-horn, an owl,
And the dim deer he hunts, rush on before;
The forests crash, and whirlwinds are the leaves,
And all the skies a-thunder, as he hurls
Straight on the circle, horse and hounds and stag. ”

“ Of love despised! though she seemed to start,
Seeing, and said, with a quick hand-wave,
"Why, one would think that that was your heart,"
While her face with a sudden thought grew grave.
But I answered nothing. And so to her home
We came in the twilight; falling clear,
With a few first stars and a moon's curved foam,
Over the hush of meadow and mere,
Whence the boom of the bittern would often come. ”

“ I deemed eternal as God's love:
No more than shadows these shall prove,
And insubstantial as a thought.
And love and labor, who have gone,
Hand in close hand, and civilized
The wilderness, these shall be prized
No more than if they had not done.
Then wherefore strive? Why strain and bend
Beneath a burden so unjust?
Our works are builded out of dust,
And dust their universal end. ”

“ With a hand on her bosom, her heart's quick breath,
Replied to his heat, "They would take and slay
Thee who art life of me!—No! not thus
Shall we fly! there's another way for us;
A way that is sure; an only way;
[60] I have thought it out this many a day."—
The words that she spoke, how well I remember!
As well as the mood o' that day of December,
That bullied and blustered and seemed in league,
Like a spiteful shrew, with the wind and snow,
To drown the words of their sweet intrigue,
With the boom of the boughs tossed to and fro. ”

“ A far Tyrolean melody of love,
Heard on an Alpine path at close of day
When shepherds homeward lead their tinkling flocks.
And when she left, being with you awhile,—
How shall I say it?—'t was as when one hath
Beheld an Undine by the moonlit Rhine,
Who, ere the mind adjusts a thought, is gone,
And in your soul you wonder if a dream. ”

“ Man must evolve his spiritual end.
It is with deeds that we must ask
Forgiveness; for upon this earth,
Life walks alone from very birth
With death, hope tells us is a mask
For life beyond of vaster worth,
Where sin no more sets love a task. ”

“ Who sits and rubs stiff eyes that still will close.
Horns sang and deer-hounds tugged a whimpering leash,
Or, loosened, bounded through the baying glens:
And ere the mountain mists, compact of white,
Broke wild before the azure spears of day,
The far-off hunt, that woke the woods to life,
Seemed but the heart-beat of the ancient hills.
And then, near noon, within a forest brake,
[40] The ban-dogs roused a red gigantic stag,
Lashed to whose back with gnarly-knotted cords,
And borne along like some pale parasite,
A man shrieked: tangle-bearded, and wild hair
A mane of forest-burs. ”

“ Ah, love at best is insecure,
And lives with doubt and vain regret;
And hope and faith, with faces set
Upon the past, are never sure;
And through their fever, grief, and fret
The heart may fail that should endure.
For in ourselves, however blend
The passions that make heaven and hell,
Is evil not accountable
For most the good we comprehend? ”

“ The fathers of our fathers they were men!
[99]
"Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin" I.
Behold! we have gathered together our battleships near and afar;
Their decks they are cleared for action, their guns they are shotted for war:
From the East to the West there is hurry, in the North and the South a peal
Of hammers in fort and shipyard, and the clamor and clang of steel;
And the roar and the rush of engines, and clanking of derrick and crane—
Thou art weighed in the Scales and found wanting, the balance of God, O Spain!
II.
Behold! ”

“ Dreaming of days that pass like almoners
Scattering their alms in minted gold of flowers;
Of nights, that forest all the skies with stars,
Wherethrough the moon—bare-bosomed huntress—rides,
One cloud before her like a flying fawn.
Then I proposed the season's hunt; till eve
The test of Rudolf's skill postponed, at which
He seemed impatient. And 't was then I heard
How he an execrable marksman was;
And tales that told of near, incredible shots,
That missed their mark; or how his flint-lock oft
Flashed harmless powder, while the curious deer
Stood staring ”

“ Is laid the Sword of Liberty, and the balance dips, O Spain!
III.
Summon thy vessels together! great is thy need for these!—
Cristobal Colon, Vizcaya, Oquendo, and Maria Terese—
Let them be strong and many, for a vision I had by night,
That the ancient wrongs thou hast done the world came howling to the fight;
From the New-World shores they gathered, Inca and Aztec slain,
To the Cuban shot but yesterday, and our own dead seamen, Spain!
IV.
Summon thy ships together, gather a mighty fleet! ”

“ Unknown to all, with all the love unquelled
Of first impressions, and against my will.
At last despair of winning me compelled
Him to the oath he swore: He would not kill,
But take me living and would make my life
A living death. No man should make me wife. ”

“ Was then enfellowed. "Yes," said I, "he's young.
Kurt, he is young; but see, a wiry frame;
A chamois footing and a face for deeds;
An eye that likes me not; too quick to turn;
But that may be the restless soul within;
A soul perhaps with virtues that have been
Severely tried and could not stand the test;
These be thy care, Kurt; and if not too deep
In vices of the flesh, discover them,
As divers bring lost riches up from ooze.
Thou hast a daughter; let him be thy son."
A year thereafter was it that I heard
Of Rudolf's passion for Kurt's Ilsabe ”

“ To spur as men spur warward:
A war-whoop rang this side a rock:
Then painted faces swarmed, to block
Our way, with brandished tomahawk
And rifle: then a shout, a shock—
And we again rode forward.
[74]
They followed; but 'twas no great while
Before from them by some long mile
Of forest we were sundered.
We galloped on. I'd lost my gun;
And Bell, whose girth had come undone,
Rode saddleless. The summer sun
Was up when into Lexington
Side unto side we thundered.
Too late. For Todd had left that day
With many men. ”

“ For the shapely deer that bounded
Past him when his bow he drew.
Not one hound or huntsman follows.
Through the underbrush and moss
Goes the slot; and in the hollows
Of the hills, that he must cross,
He has lost it. He must fare
Over rocks where she-wolves lair;
Wood-pools where the wild-boar wallows;
So he leaves his good steed there.
Through his mind then flashed an olden
Legend told him by the monks:—
Of a girl, whose hair is golden,
Haunting fountains and the trunks
Of the woodland; who, they say,
Is a white doe all the day ”

“ In which on that dark day she thought to hide
From Rupert when, at last, 't was manifest
We could not hold the Manse. There was no pride
In her deep eyes now; nor did scorn invest
Her with such dignity as once defied
Him bursting in to find her standing here
Prepared to die like some dog-hunted deer.
XXV.
She took my hand, and, as if naught of love
Had ever been between us, said,—"All know
The madness of that day when with his glove
He struck then slew my brother, and brought woe
On all our house; and thou, incensed above
The rest, came here, and made my foe thy foe. ”

“ What need I more of heaven then than you?
Flowers are not sweeter than your face is sweet—
What need I more to make my world complete?
O woman nature, love that still endures,
What strength hath ours that is not born of yours? ”

“ By one short inch the circle, for, unseen
Though now they be, Hell's minions still are there,
Watching with flaming eyes to seize your soul.
But when the hour of midnight sounds, be sure
You have your bullets, neither more nor less ”

“ What is this vague regret,
This yearning, so like tears,
That touches through the years
Long past, when Myth and Fable
In all strange things were able
To beautify the Earth,
Things of immortal worth?—
This longing, that to me
Is like a memory
Lived long ago, of those
Fair children who, it knows,
Loved with no mortal love ”

“ Vague, gesturing shapes, that loom like moonlit mists,
Their faces human but with animal forms,
Rise thick around and threaten to destroy.
No cry, no word, no whisper should there come,
Weeping, a wandering shadow like the girl
You love, or loved, now lost to you, her eyes
Hollow with tears; all palely beckoning
With beautiful arms, or censuring; her face
Sad with a desolate love ”

“ Without duplicity,
Whom love made know,
That hearts in meter
Make earth completer;
And kisses, sweeter
Than—berries grow.
[90]
To a Pansy-Violet Found Solitary Among the Hills. I.
O pansy-violet,
With early April wet,
How frail and pure you look
Lost in this glow-worm nook
Of heaven-holding hills:
Down which the hurrying rills
Fling scrolls of melodies:
O'er which the birds and bees
Weave gossamers of song,
Invisible, but strong:
Sweet music webs they spin
To snare the spirit in. ”

“ She feels for the spring in the sliding panel
'Neath the arras, hid in the carven oak.
It opens. The stair, like a well's dark channel,
Yawns; and the draught makes her taper slope.
Wrapped deep in her mantle she stoops, now puts
One foot on the stair; now a listening pause
As nearer and nearer the mad search draws
Of the thwarted castle. No smallest hope
That they find her now that the panel shuts!...
If the wind, that howls like a tortured thing,
Would throttle itself with itself, then I
Might hear how her hurrying footsteps ring
Down the hollow ... there! ”

“ Or was it that your love at last
My soul so long had craved,
From the sweet sin that held me fast
At that last moment saved?
[86]
Content
When I behold how some pursue
Fame, that is care's embodiment,
Or fortune, whose false face looks true,—
A humble home with sweet content
Is all I ask for me and you. ”

“ Of flow'rs, these crush before one blossom swings.
But here and there the wisdom of a School
Unknown to these hath often written down
"Fame" in white ink the future hath turned brown;
When every beauty, heaped with ridicule,
In their ignoble prose, proved their renown,
Making each famous—as an ass or fool. ”

“ Black breast, the Manse, a burning carbuncle,
Blazed like a battle-beacon, and alarms
Of onslaught clanged around it; then, like one
Who bears with him God's curse, I galloped on.
[35]
The Forester
I met him here at Ammendorf one Spring. ”

“ And on the lonely cross-way you must draw
A blood-red circle with a bloody sword;
And round the circle, runic characters,
Gaunt and satanic; here a skull, and there
A scythe and cross-bones, and an hour-glass here;
And in the centre, fed with coffin-wood,
Stol'n from the grave of one, a murderer,
A smouldering fire. Eleven of the clock
The first ball leaves the mold—the sullen lead
Mixed with three bullets that have hit their mark,
And blood, the wounded Sacramental Host
Stolen, and hence unhallowed, oozed, when shot
Fixed to a riven pine. ”

“ With saddles girt and reins held fast,
Our rifles well in front, at last
Tom Bell and I were mounted.
The gate swung wide. We said, "Good-bye."
No time for talk had Bell and I.
One said, "God speed!" another, "Fly!"
Then out we galloped. Live or die,
We felt each moment counted.
The trace, the buffaloes had worn,
Stretched broad before us; and the corn
And cane through which it wended,
We knew for acres from the gate
Hid Indian guile and Tory hate.
We rode with hearts that seemed to wait
For instant death; and on our fate
The Station's fate depended.
[73]
No rifle cracked. ”

“ A man's true soul you could not help but see.
As royal a Rhenish, I will vouch to say,
As that, old legends tell, which Necromance
And Magic keep, gnome-guarded, in huge casks
Of antique make deep in the Kyffhäuser,
[36] The Cellar of the Knights near Sittendorf.—
So solaced of that wine we sat an hour.
He told me his intent in coming here.
His name was Rudolf; and his native home,
Franconia; but no word of parentage:
Only his mind to don the buff and green
And live a forester with us and be
Enfellowed in the Duke of Brunswick's train,
And for the Duke's estate even now was bound. ”

“ So I spoke what I thought—"Then, it appears"—
[52]
And stopped with, it seemed, my soul in my gaze—
"That you are not happy, Leona of Verne?
There is that at your heart which—well, betrays
These mocking mummeries.—Live and learn!—
And this is the truth that the poet says:—
"'I went to my love and I told with my heart,
In words of the soul, that are silent in speech,
All of my passion, too sacred for art ”

“ When this young Kuno, with fierce eyes, wherein
Hunt and impatience kindled reckless flame,
[41] Cried, "Has the dew then made our powder wet?
Or have we left our marksmanship at home?
Here's for its heart! the Fiend direct my ball!"—
And fired into a covert deeply packed,
An intertangled wall of matted night,
Wherein the eye might vainly strive and strive
To pierce one fathom, earn one foot beyond.
But, ha! the huge stag staggered from the brake
Hit full i' the heart. ”