The bird winging the evening sky
Flies onward without song;
The crowding years as they pass by
Flow on in mutest throng.

The fishes glide through liquid deep
And never speak a word;
The angels round about us sweep,
And yet no voice is heard.

The highest thoughts no utterance find,
The holiest hope is dumb,

In silence grows the immortal mind,
And speechless deep joys come.

Rapt adoration has no tongue,
No words has holiest prayer;
The loftiest mountain peaks among
Is stillness everywhere.

With sweetest music silence blends,
And silent praise is best;
In silence life begins and ends:
God cannot be expressed.

FOREPLEDGED

O WOMAN, let thy heart not cleave
To any poet's soul;
For he the muse will never leave,
But follow to life's goal.

Then trust him not, he is not thine,
Whate'er he seems to be;
Strong unseen tendrils round him twine,
And keep him still from thee.

His words with passion are athrill,
And bear contagious fire;
He knows the charmer's perfect skill
To wake the heart's desire.

But love him not, his love is woe;
The genius at his side
Would prove for thee a fatal foe
Wert thou his wedded bride.

FROM "GOD AND THE SOUL"

NATURE AND THE CHILD

FOR many bessings I to God upraise
A thankful heart; the life Ile gives is fair
And sweet and good, since He is every
where,

Still with me even in the darkest ways.
But most I thank Him for my earliest days,
Passed in the fields and in the open air,
With flocks and birds and flowers, free
from all care,

And glad as brook that through a meadow strays.

O balmy air, O orchards white with bloom,
O waving fields of ever-varying green,
O deep, mysterious woods, whose leafy
gloom

Invites to pensive dreams of worlds unseen,
To thoughts as solemn as the silent tomb,
No power from you my heart can ever wean!

That it may glow with a more perfect grace, And bear a nobler life through boundless space,

Till time shall bring eternity in sight.
So man, if he would truly live, must die,
Descending through the grave that he may
rise

To higher worlds and dwell in purer sky;
Making of seeming life the sacrifice
To share the perfect life with God on high,
Where love divine is the infinite prize.

THE VOID BETWEEN

WHEN from the gloom of earth we see the sky,

The happy stars seem each to other near, And their low-whispered words we almost hear,

As in sweet company they smile or sigh.
Alas! infinite worlds between them lie,
And solitary each within its sphere
Rolls lonely over onward without cheer,
Is born, and lives and dies with no one

near.

And so men's souls seem close together bound,

But worlds immeasurable lie between,
And each is centre in a void profound,
Wherein he lonely lives sad or serene,
And, planet-like, moves higher centre round,
Whence light he draws as from the sun
night's Queen.

AT THE NINTH HOUR

ELI, Eli, lama sabacthani?

() sadder than the ocean's wailing moan, Sadder than homes whence life and joy have flown,

Than graves where those we love in darkness lie;

More full of anguish than all agony
Of broken hearts, forsaken of their own
And left in hopeless misery alone,
Is this, O sweet and loving Christ, Thy
cry!

For this, this only is infinite pain:
To feel that God Himself has turned away.
If He abide, all loss may still be gain,
And darkest night be beautiful as day.
But lacking Him the universe is vain,
And man's immortal soul is turned to
clay.

THE REED

"ET ARUNDINEM IN DEXTERA EJUS" BENEATH the Memnonian shadows of Mem

phis, it rose from the slime,

A reed of the river, self-hid, as though shunning the curse of its crime, And it shook as it measured in whispers the lapses of tide and of time.

It shuddered, it stooped, and was dumb, when the kings of the earth passed along.

For what could this reed of the river in the race of the swift and the strong, Where the wolf met the bear and the panther, blood-bathed, at the banquets of wrong?

These loved the bright brass, the hard steel, and the gods that kill and condemn;

Yea, theirs was the robe silver-tissued, and theirs was the sun-colored gem; If they touched thee, O reed, 't was to wing with swift death thy sharp arrowy

stem.

Then the strong took the corn and the wine, and the poor, who had scattered the seed,

Went forth to the wilderness weeping, and sought out a sign in their need, And the gods laughed in rapturous thunder, and showed them the windshaken reed.

O dower of the poor and the helpless! O key to Thought's palace unpriced! When the strong mocked with cruel crimson

and spat in the face of their Christ, When the thorns were his crown-in his faint palm this reed for a sceptre sufficed;

Whilst ye reft him of worship and wealth, and he stood mute and dazed in your don,

A reed-stalk remained for a sceptre; ye left in his hand the pen.

Sweet wooer, strong winner of kingship, above crown, crosier and sword, By thee shall the mighty be broken, and the spoil which their might hath stored Shall be stamped small as dust, and be wafted away by the breath of the Lord.

His decree is gone forth, it is planted, and these are the words which he spake,

No shouldering flax of first fancy, no full flame of thought, will he slake, No bruised reed of the writer shall the strength of eternities break.

Behold your sign and your sceptre. Arise, imperial reed,

Go forth to discrown king and captain and disinherit the creed;

O strike through the iron war-tower and cast out the murderer's seed;

The eyes that neither laugh nor weep, That neither hope nor fear,

That neither watch nor dream nor sleep,
Nor sympathize nor sneer;

The eyes that neither spurn nor choose,
Nor question nor reply,
That neither pardon nor accuse,
That yield not nor defy;

The eyes that hide not nor reveal,
That trust not nor betray,
That acquiesce not nor appeal,-
The eyes that never pray.

O love that will not be forgot!

O love that leaves alone!

O love that blinds and blesses not! O love that turns to stone!

A SONG FOR LEXINGTON
THE spring came carlier on
Than usual that year;

The shadiest snow was gone,
The slowest brook was clear,
And warming in the sun
Shy flowers began to peer.

'Twas more like middle May,
The earth so seemed to thrive,
That Nineteenth April day
Of Seventeen Seventy-Five;
Winter was well away,
New England was alive!

Alive and sternly glad!

Her doubts were with the snow;
Her courage, long forbade,
Ran full to overtlow;
And every hope she had
Began to bud and grow.

She rose betimes that morn,
For there was work to do;
A planting, not of corn,
Of what she hardly knew, -
Blessings for men unborn;
And well she did it too l

With open hand she stood, And sowed for all the years,

And watered it with blood,
And watered it with tears,
The seed of quickening food.
For both the hemispheres.

This was the planting done
That April morn of fame;
Honor to every one

To that seed-field that came !
Honor to Lexington,

Our first immortal name!

MAN AND NATURE

O STEADFAST trees that know
Rain, hail, and sleet, and snow,
And all the winds that blow;

But when spring comes, can then
So freshly bud again
Forgetful of the wrong!

Waters that deep below
The stubborn ice can go
With quiet underflow,

Contented to be dumb

Till spring herself shall come To listen to your song!

Stars that the clouds pass o'er And stain not, but make more Alluring than before:

How good it is for us

That your lives are not thus Prevented, but made strong!

THE MAKING OF MAN

As the insect from the rock

Takes the color of its wing; As the boulder from the shock Of the ocean's rhythmic swing Makes itself a perfect form,

Learns a calmer front to raise; As the shell, enamelled warm

With the prism's mystic rays, Praises wind and wave that make All its chambers fair and strong;

As the mighty poets take
Grief and pain to build their song:
Even so for every soul,

Whatsoe'er its lot may be,-
Building, as the heavens roll,

Something large and strong and free,Things that hurt and things that mar Shape the man for perfect praise; Shock and strain and ruin are

Friendlier than the smiling days.

Who there some time have made their happy stay,

And much have longed for them to come that way,

What shall it be, this sign of hope and cheer?

Shall it be tone of voice or glance of eye? Shall it be touch of hand or gleam of hair Blown back from spirit-brows by heaven's nir,

Things which of old we knew our dearest by ?

Oh, naught of this; but, if our love is true,

Some secret sense shall cry, 'Tis you and -you!