Alas, for the poor to have some part In yon sweet living lands of Art, Makes problem not for head, but heart.
Vainly might Plato's brain revolve it:
Plainly the heart of a child could solve it."And then, as when from words that seem but rude We pass to silent pain that sits abrood Back in our heart's great dark and solitude, [71]
So sank the strings to gentle throbbing Of long chords change-marked with sobbing --Motherly sobbing, not distinctlier heard Than half wing-openings of the sleeping bird, Some dream of danger to her young hath stirred.
Then stirring and demurring ceased, and lo!
Every least ripple of the strings' song-flow Died to a level with each level bow And made a great chord tranquil-surfaced so, As a brook beneath his curving bank doth go[81]
To linger in the sacred dark and green Where many boughs the still pool overlean And many leaves make shadow with their sheen.
But presently A velvet flute-note fell down pleasantly Upon the bosom of that harmony, And sailed and sailed incessantly, As if a petal from a wild-rose blown Had fluttered down upon that pool of tone And boatwise dropped o' the convex side[91]
And floated down the glassy tide And clarified and glorified The solemn spaces where the shadows bide.
From the warm concave of that fluted note Somewhat, half song, half odor, forth did float, As if a rose might somehow be a throat:
"When Nature from her far-off glen Flutes her soft messages to men, The flute can say them o'er again;Yea, Nature, singing sweet and lone, [101]
Breathes through life's strident polyphone The flute-voice in the world of tone.
Sweet friends, Man's love ascends To finer and diviner ends Than man's mere thought e'er comprehends For I, e'en I, As here I lie, A petal on a harmony, Demand of Science whence and why [111]
Man's tender pain, man's inward cry, When he doth gaze on earth and sky?
I am not overbold:
I hold Full powers from Nature manifold.
I speak for each no-tongued tree That, spring by spring, doth nobler be, And dumbly and most wistfully His mighty prayerful arms outspreads Above men's oft-unheeding heads, [121]
And his big blessing downward sheds.
I speak for all-shaped blooms and leaves, Lichens on stones and moss on eaves, Grasses and grains in ranks and sheaves;Broad-fronded ferns and keen-leaved canes, And briery mazes bounding lanes, And marsh-plants, thirsty-cupped for rains, And milky stems and sugary veins;For every long-armed woman-vine That round a piteous tree doth twine; [131]
For passionate odors, and divine Pistils, and petals crystalline;All purities of shady springs, All shynesses of film-winged things That fly from tree-trunks and bark-rings;All modesties of mountain-fawns That leap to covert from wild lawns, And tremble if the day but dawns;All sparklings of small beady eyes Of birds, and sidelong glances wise [141]
Wherewith the jay hints tragedies;
All piquancies of prickly burs, And smoothnesses of downs and furs Of eiders and of minevers;All limpid honeys that do lie At stamen-bases, nor deny The humming-birds' fine roguery, Bee-thighs, nor any butterfly;All gracious curves of slender wings, Bark-mottlings, fibre-spiralings, [151]
Fern-wavings and leaf-flickerings;
Each dial-marked leaf and flower-bell Wherewith in every lonesome dell Time to himself his hours doth tell;All tree-sounds, rustlings of pine-cones, Wind-sighings, doves' melodious moans, And night's unearthly under-tones;All placid lakes and waveless deeps, All cool reposing mountain-steeps, Vale-calms and tranquil lotos-sleeps; -- [161]
Yea, all fair forms, and sounds, and lights, And warmths, and mysteries, and mights, Of Nature's utmost depths and heights, -- These doth my timid tongue present, Their mouthpiece and leal instrument And servant, all love-eloquent.
I heard, when `ALL FOR LOVE' the violins cried:
So, Nature calls through all her system wide, `Give me thy love, O man, so long denied.'
Much time is run, and man hath changed his ways, [171]
Since Nature, in the antique fable-days, Was hid from man's true love by proxy fays, False fauns and rascal gods that stole her praise.
The nymphs, cold creatures of man's colder brain, Chilled Nature's streams till man's warm heart was fain Never to lave its love in them again.
Later, a sweet Voice `Love thy neighbor' said;Then first the bounds of neighborhood outspread Beyond all confines of old ethnic dread.
Vainly the Jew might wag his covenant head: [181]
`ALL MEN ARE NEIGHBORS,' so the sweet Voice said.
So, when man's arms had circled all man's race, The liberal compass of his warm embrace Stretched bigger yet in the dark bounds of space;With hands a-grope he felt smooth Nature's grace, Drew her to breast and kissed her sweetheart face:
Yea man found neighbors in great hills and trees And streams and clouds and suns and birds and bees, And throbbed with neighbor-loves in loving these.
But oh, the poor! the poor! the poor! [191]
That stand by the inward-opening door Trade's hand doth tighten ever more, And sigh their monstrous foul-air sigh For the outside hills of liberty, Where Nature spreads her wild blue sky For Art to make into melody!
Thou Trade! thou king of the modern days!
Change thy ways, Change thy ways;
Let the sweaty laborers file [201]
A little while, A little while, Where Art and Nature sing and smile.
Trade! is thy heart all dead, all dead?
And hast thou nothing but a head?
I'm all for heart," the flute-voice said, And into sudden silence fled, Like as a blush that while 'tis red Dies to a still, still white instead.
Thereto a thrilling calm succeeds,[211]
Till presently the silence breeds A little breeze among the reeds That seems to blow by sea-marsh weeds:
Then from the gentle stir and fret Sings out the melting clarionet, Like as a lady sings while yet Her eyes with salty tears are wet.
"O Trade! O Trade!" the Lady said, "I too will wish thee utterly dead If all thy heart is in thy head.[221]
For O my God! and O my God!
