AH, BE NOT FALSE Of the tiny mouth, and lo! From those eyes two tearlets flow; · But she could not understand And like a bird she sang and said, – Do you love me? Do you love me? INDIRECTION 223 I SAW not the leaf But its shadow trembling, trembling down. I faced to northward, to my grief, When from the southern sky a crimson meteor lit the star-dark town. I saw not naked Love Lean from his porphyry throne above And touch her heart to flame, Yet on her brow I saw the swift, sweet, virgin shame. "AH, BE NOT FALSE" Aн, be not false, sweet Splendor! Be wise as thou art tender; Be all that Beauty should. Not lightly be thy citadel subdued; Take praise in solemn mood; THE ANSWER THROUGH starry space two angels dreamed their flight, 'Mid worlds and thoughts of worlds, through day and night. Then one spake forth whose voice was like the flower That blossoms in the fragrant midnight hour. This white-browed angel of the other asked: "Of all the essences that ever basked In the eternal presence; of all things, All thoughts, all joys, all dreads, all sorrowings Being, or shall be, or forever past — Profound with dark, or hid in endless light Then did the elder speak, the while he turned HOW DEATH MAY MAKE A MAN DEATH is a sorry plight, It bringeth unto man End of all delight. Yet many a woeful wight Only dying can Quit him like a man. CAME TO A MASTER OF SONG Dawdling, drawling, silly, Maundering, scarce a man; Driven will y-nilly; When he's dying will he Run as once he ran, Or quit him like a man? Vile from out the wrack Crawls he less than man; Cowering in his track Beaten, broken, black; Curse him if you can Death may make him man. In life the wretch did naught Now by Death he's caught, Whom the world did ban Braced stiff against the wall, Lost life and honor, all! At Death's quick touch and call See, the craven can Quit him like a man. "CAME TO A MASTER OF SONG” CAME to a master of song And the human heart One who had followed him long And worshiped his art; 225* One whom the poet's singing Came to him once in an hour And cried, "Thou alone hast power If to a wretch like me Thou wilt stoop, O master!" Answered the bard with shame, And sorrow and trembling: "Was I false, was my song to blame? Was my art dissembling? I of all mortals the saddest, SOME from books resound their rhymes Set them ringing with a faint, Sorrowful, and sweet, and quaint Memory of the olden times, Like the sound of evening chimes. Some go wandering on their way MERIDIAN Bards there be the deep sky under And those have sung whose melody, 227 MERIDIAN HENCEFORTH before these feet Sinks the downward way; A little while to greet The light and life of day, Then night's slow fall Now forward, heart elate, Tho' steep the pathway slope. Ends all. Still the warm sky is blue, No fleck the sunlight mars; "Twixt hills the sea gleams through; With twilight come the stars; And night's slow fall Ends all. |