Part 57 (1/2)

Moods and Memories.

Poems of Nature and Love.

Red Leaves and Roses.

THE WHIPPOORWILL.

(_From Red Leaves and Roses._[52])

I.

Above long woodland ways that led To dells the stealthy twilights tread The west was hot geranium-red; And still, and still, Along old lanes, the locusts sow With cl.u.s.tered curls the May-times know, Out of the crimson afterglow, We heard the homeward cattle low, And then the far-off, far-off woe Of ”whippoorwill!” of ”whippoorwill!”

II.

Beneath the idle beechen boughs We heard the cow-bells of the cows Come slowly jangling towards the house; And still, and still, Beyond the light that would not die Out of the scarlet-haunted sky, Beyond the evening-star's white eye Of glittering chalcedony, Drained out of dusk the plaintive cry Of ”whippoorwill!” of ”whippoorwill!”

III.

What is there in the moon, that swims A naked bosom o'er the limbs, That all the wood with magic dims?

While still, while still, Among the trees whose shadows grope 'Mid ferns and flow'rs the dew-drops ope,-- Lost in faint deeps of heliotrope Above the clover-scented slope,-- Retreats, despairing past all hope, The whippoorwill, the whippoorwill.

FOOTNOTE:

[52] By permission of the author, and publishers, G. P. Putnam's Sons, N. Y.

DIXIE.

I.

I wish I wuz in de land ob cotton, Ole times dar am not forgotten; Look away! look away! look away!

Dixie land.

In Dixie land whar I wuz born in, Early on one frosty mornin'; Look away! look away! look away!

Dixie land.

CHORUS.

Den I wish I were in Dixie, hooray! hooray!

In Dixie land I'll took my stand To lib and die in Dixie, Away, away, away down south in Dixie, Away, away, away down south in Dixie.

II.

Dar's buckwheat cakes and Ingen batter, Makes you fat or a little fatter; Den hoe it down and scratch your grabble, To Dixie land I'm bound to trabble.