Part 4 (2/2)

Quaffing Pierian draughts from Boston pump, They toiled to prove their homiletic art Could match with nasal tw.a.n.g and pulpit thump In maxims glib of meeting-house and mart.

Serenely their ovine admirers graze.

Apollo wears frock-coats, the Muses stays.

THE SINGER'S QUEST

I've been wandering, listening for a song, Dreaming of a melody, all my life long ...

The lilting tune that G.o.d sang to rock the tides asleep And crooned above the cradled stars before they learned to creep.

O, there was laughter in it and many a merry chime Before He had turned moralist, grown old before His time, And He was happy, trolling out His great blithe-hearted tune, Before He slung the little earth beneath the sun and moon.

But I know that somewhere that song is rolling on, Like flutes along the midnight, like trumpets in the dawn; It throbs across the sunset and stirs the poplar tree And rumbles in the long low thunder of the sea.

First-love sang me one note and heart-break taught me two, A child has told me three notes, and soon I'll know it through; And when I stand before the Throne I'll hum it low and sly, Watching for a great light of welcome in His eye...

”Put a white raiment on him and a harp into his hand And golden sandals on his feet and tell the saints to stand A little farther off unless they wish to hear the truth, For this blessed lucky sinner is going to sing about my youth!”

DEAD MAGDALEN

Cover her over with pallid white roses, Her who had none but red roses to wear; All that her last grim lover bestows is Virginal white for her bosom and hair.

Cover the folds of the glimmering sheet Clear from her eyelids weary and sweet Down to her nevermore wayward feet.

Then They may find her fair.

Lovingly, tenderly, let us array her Fair as a bride for the way she must go, Leaving no lingering stain to betray her, Letting them see we have sullied her so.

Over the curve of the fair young breast Leave we this maidenly lily to rest White as the snow in its snow-soft nest.

Now They will never know.

THE ADVENTURER

He came not in the red dawn Nor in the blaze of noon, And all the long bright highway Lay lonely to the moon,

And nevermore, we know now, Will he come wandering down The breezy hollows of the hills That gird the quiet town.

For he has heard a voice cry A starry-faint ”Ahoy!”

Far up the wind, and followed Unquestioning after joy.

But we are long forgetting The quiet way he went, With looks of love and gentle scorn So sweetly, subtly blent.

We cannot cease to wonder, We who have loved him, how He fares along the windy ways His feet must travel now.

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