Song-Surf

Spirit of rain!
So would I lead my dead thoughts high and higher,
Till they regain
Birth and the beauty of a new life's fire.

AUTUMN AT THE BRIDGE

Brown dropping of leaves,
Soft rush of the wind,
Slow searing of sheaves
On the hill;
Green plunging of frogs,
Cool lisp of the brook,
Far barking of dogs
At the mill;
Hot hanging of clouds,
High poise of the hawk,
Flush laughter of crowds
From the Ridge;
Nut-falling, quail-calling,
Wheel-rumbling, bee-mumbling —
Oh, sadness, gladness, madness,
Of an autumn day at the bridge!

TEARLESS

Do women weep when men have died?
It cannot be!
For I have sat here by his side,
Breathing dear names against his face,
That he must list to, were his place
Over God's throne —
Yet have I wept no tear and made no moan.

Do women weep – not gaze stone-eyed?
Grief seems in vain.
Do women weep? – I was his bride —
They brought him to me cold and pale —
Upon his lids I saw the trail
Of deathly pain.
They said, "Her tears will fall like autumn rain."

I cannot weep! Not if hot tears,
Dropped on his lids,
Might burn him back to life and years
Of yearning love, would any rise
To flood the anguish from my eyes —
And I'm his bride!
Ah me, do women weep when men have died?

SUNSET-LOVERS

Upon how many a hill,
Across how many a field,
Beside how many a river's restful flowing,
They stand, with eyes a-thrill,
And hearts of day-rue healed,
Gazing, O wistful sun, upon thy going!

They have forgotten life,
Forgotten sunless death;
Desire is gone – is it not gone for ever?
No memory of strife
Have they, or pain-sick breath.
No hopes to fear or fears hope cannot sever.

Silent the gold steals down
The west, and mystery
Moves deeper in their hearts and settles darker.
'Tis faded – the day's crown;
But strange and shadowy
They see the Unseen as night falls stark and starker.

Like priests whose altar fires
Are spent, immovable
They stand, in awful ecstasy uplifted.
Zephyrs awake tree-lyres,
The starry deeps are full,
Earth with a mystic majesty is gifted.

Ah, sunset-lovers, though
Time were but pulsing pain,
And death no more than its eternal ceasing,
Would you not choose the throe,
Hold the oblivion vain,
To have beheld so many a day's releasing?

THE EMPTY CROSS

The eve of Golgotha had come,
And Christ lay shrouded in the garden Tomb:
Among the olives, Oh, how dumb,
How sad the sun incarnadined the gloom!

The hill grew dim – the pleading cross
Reached empty arms toward the closing gate.
Jerusalem, oh, count thy loss!
Oh, hear ye! hear ye! ere it be too late!

Reached bleeding arms – but how in vain!