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Hymn to Demeter

Weave the dance. and raise again the sacred chorus;

Wreathe the garlands of the spring about the hair;

Now once more the meadows burst in bloom before us,

Crying swallows dart and glitter through the air.

Glints the plowshare in the brown and fragrant furrow;

Pigeons coo in shady coverts as they pair;

Come the furtive mountain folk from cave and burrow,

Lean, and blinking at the sunlight's sudden glare.

Bright through midmost heaven moves the lesser Lion;

Hide the Hyades in ocean caverns hoar;

Past the shoulders of the sunset flames Orion,

Following the sisters seaward evermore.

Gleams the east at evening, lit by low Arcturus;

Out to subtle-scented dawns beside the shore;

Yet a little and the Pleiades will lure us:

Weave the dance and raise the chorus as of yore.

Far to eastward up the fabled gulf of Issus,

Northward, southward, westward, now the trader goes,

Passing headlands clustered yellow with narcissus,

Bright with hyacinth, with poppy, and with rose.

Shines the sea and falls the billow as undaunted,

Past the rising of the stars that no man knows,

Sails he onward through the islands siren-haunted,

Till the clashing gates of rock before him close.

Kindly Mother of the beasts and birds and flowers,

Gracious bringer of the barley and the grain,

Earth awakened feels thy sunlight and thy showers;

Great Demeter! Let us call thee not in vain;

Lead us safely from the seed-time to the threshing,

Past the harvest and the vineyard's purple stain;

Let us see thy corn-pale hair the sunlight meshing,

When the sounding flails of autumn swing again.

Yale Review                                      Louis V. Ledoux

Over the Wintry Threshold

Over the wintry threshold

Who comes with joy today,

So frail, yet so enduring,

To triumph o'er dismay?

Ah, quick her tears are springing,

And quickly they are dried,

For sorrow walks before her,

But gladness walks beside.

She comes with gusts of laughter, --

The music as it rills;

With tenderness and sweetness,

The wisdom of the hills.

Her hands are strong to comfort,

Her heart is quick to heed;

She knows the signs of sadness,

She knows the voice of need;

There is no living creature,

However poor or small,

But she will know its trouble,

And hearken to its call.

Oh, well they fare forever,

By mighty dreams possessed,

Whose hearts have lain a moment

On that eternal breast.

Smart Set                  Bliss Carman

In April

If I am slow forgetting,

It is because the sun

Has such old tricks of setting

When April days are done.

The soft spring sunlight traces

Old patterns -- green and gold;

The flowers have no new faces,

The very buds are old!

If I am slow forgetting --

Ah, well, come back and see

The same old sunbeams petting

My garden-plots and me.

Come smell the green things growing,

The boxwood after rain;

See where old beds are showing

Their slender spears again.

At dusk, that fosters dreaming --

Come back at dusk and rest,

And watch our old star gleaming

Against the primrose west.

Harper's                 Margaret Lee Ashley

May is Building Her House

May is building her house. With apple blossoms

She is roofing over the glimmering rooms;

Of the oak and the beech hath she builded its beams,

And, spinning all day at her secret looms,

With arras of leaves each wind-swayed wall

She pictureth over, and peopleth it all

With echoes and dreams,

And singing of streams.

May is building her house. Of petal and blade,

Of the roots of the oak is the flooring made,

With a carpet of mosses and lichen and clover,

Each small miracle over and over,

And tender, traveling green things strayed.

Her windows, the morning and evening star,

And her rustling doorways, ever ajar

With the coming and going

Of fair things blowing,

The thresholds of the four winds are.

May is building her house. From the dust of things

She is making the songs and the flowers and the wings;

From October's tossed and trodden gold

She is making the young year out of the old;

       Yea! out of winter's flying sleet

       She is making all the summer sweet,

       And the brown leaves spurned of November's feet

She is changing back again to spring's.

Harper's                 Richard Le Gallienne

In a Forgotten Burying-Ground

Eternal in the brooding of the old Norwegian spruces

I hear the wistful tenderness of loves They used to know,

And in the swelling wood-notes that the eager springtide looses

Sobs again Their heart-break from the Springs of Long Ago:

And sometime, thro' the silence, with the April shadows lying

Aslant the solemn acre where I take my dreamless rest,

Perhaps the stifled need of You my heart was ever crying

Will find its way across the years -- to stir a stranger's breast!

The Poetry Journal                         Ruth Guthrie Harding

Wind

The Wind bows down the poplar trees,

The Wind bows down the crested seas;

And he has bowed the heart of me

Under his hand of memory.

O heavy-handed Wind, who goes

Hurting the petals of the rose;

Who leaves the grasses on the hill

Broken and pallid, spent and still!

O heavy-handed Wind, who brings

To me all echoing ancient things:

Echoing sorrow and defeat,

Crying like mourners, hard to meet!

The Wind bows down the poplar trees

And all the ocean's argosies;

But deeper bends the heart of me,

Under his hand of memory.

Harper's            Fannie Stearns Davis

The Speckled Trout

With rod and line I took my way

That led me through the gossip trees,

Where all the forest was asway

With hurry of the running breeze.

I took my hat off to a flower

That nodded welcome as I passed;

And, pelted by a morning shower,

Unto its heart a bee held fast.

A head of gold one great weed tossed,

And leaned to look when I went by;

And where the brook the roadway crossed

The daisy kept on me its eye.

And when I stopped to bathe my face,

And seat me at a great tree's foot,

I heard the stream say, "Mark the place:

And undermine it rock and root."

And o'er the whirling water there

A dragonfly its shuttle plied,

Where wild a fern let down its hair,

And leaned to see the water's pride --

A speckled trout. The spotted elf,

Whom I had come so far to see,

Stretched out above a rocky shelf,

A shadow sleeping mockingly.

.    .    .    .    .    .    .

And I have sat here half the day

Regarding it, It has not stirred.

I heard the running water say --

"He does not know the magic word.

"The word that changes everything,

And brings all Nature to his hand:

That makes of this great trout a king,

And opes the way to Faeryland."

The Bellman            Madison Cawein

Trees

I think that I shall never see

A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest

Against the sweet earth's hungry breast;

A tree that looks at God all day

And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear

A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;

Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,

But only God can make a tree!

Poetry, A Magazine of Verse
                            Joyce Kilmer

In the Hospital

Because on the branch that is tapping my pane

A sun-wakened leaf-bud, uncurled,

Is bursting its rusty brown sheathing in twain,

I know there is Spring in the world.

Because through the sky-patch whose azure and white

My window frames all the day long

A yellow-bird dips for an instant of flight,

I know there is Song.

Because even here in this Mansion of Woe

Where creep the dull hours, leaden-shod,

Compassion and Tenderness aid me, I know

There is God.

Scribner's                      Arthur Guiterman

Love of Life

Love you not the tall trees spreading wide their branches,

Cooling with their green shade the sunny days of June?

Love you not the little bird lost among the leaflets,

Dreamily repeating a quaint, brief tune?

Is there not a joy in the waste windy places;

Is there not a song by the long dusty way?

Is there not a glory in the sudden hour of struggle?

Is there not a peace in the long quiet day?

Love you not the meadows with the deep lush grasses;

Love you not the cloud-flocks noiseless in their flight?

Love you not the cool wind that stirs to meet the sunrise;

Love you not the stillness of the warm summer night?

Have you never wept with a grief that slowly passes;

Have you never laughed when a joy goes running by?

Know you not the peace of rest that follows labor? --

You have not learnt to live then; how can you dare to die?

Scribner's                                      Tertius van Dyke

God's Will

God meant me to be hungry,

So I should seek to find

Wisdom, and truth, and beauty,

To satisfy my mind.

God meant me to be lonely,

Lest I should wish to stay

In some green earthly Eden

Too long from heaven away.

God meant me to be weary,

That I should yearn to rest

This feeble, aching body

Deep in the earth's dark breast.

Harper's            Mildred Howells

On the Birth of a Child

Lo -- to the battle-ground of Life,

Child, you have come, like a conquering shout,

Out of a struggle -- into strife;

Out of a darkness -- into doubt.

Girt with the fragile armor of Youth,

Child, you must ride into endless wars,

With the sword of protest, the buckler of truth,

And a banner of love to sweep the stars. . . .

About you the world's despair will surge;

Into defeat you must plunge and grope --

Be to the faltering, an urge;

Be to the hopeless years, a hope!

Be to the darkened world a flame;

Be to its unconcern a blow --

For out of its pain and tumult you came,

And into its tumult and pain you go.

The Independent                     Louis Untermeyer

To a Child Falling Asleep

Over the dim edge of sleep I lean,

And in her eyes' illimitable grey distances,

Look down into the shadow-tinted space, --

The cloudy air of sleep, --

To see the rose-lit petal of a Child's fair soul

Seek dreamily the farther gloom,

Where waking eyes may follow her no more.

One more last time her lids are lifted,

And in her look I read a wistful fare-thee-well;

Her spirit waves a twinkling white hand,

Her bark is out upon the sea of dream, --

The calm, grey sea, full and immovably established,

That drinks the river of my love, without o'er flowing,

Nor ever gives my image back to me.

When o'er the sun-swept land

Murmuring twilight spread her dusky tent,

A Stranger passed before our friendly sun, --

Between the dark and dawn, --

A Stranger whom we love but never see.

And as she came and cast her blue benignant shadow over all,

She set a silver trumpet to her lips,

And blew a note that thrilled in Children's hearts;

Because in little hearts the echo-fairies love to play,

Roaming the scented meadows there,

Where Love has been and sown the amaranthine flowers,

Out of whose pristine cups were born the singing stars.

And as the first free rainbow bubble sailed,

Launched by the Stranger with the silver pipe,

Upon the listening air;

As first the hollow note

Kissed the sweet lips and died of happiness,

The little Child unfurled her sails.

I stood there on the very verge of sleep,

And called to her,

And Love's own self had deigned to wait within my heart,

(Because I kept it always fit for Childish guests)

And would have given welcome had she stayed.

But then I saw the eyelids close,

And knew that Azrael who championed her soul,

Had shut the gates lest I should see

More than my life could bear.

Yet I had seen her go,

And sight no more could hold of Beauty's wine.

I had seen the fair face flush,

As the soft curtains of the tinted west

Are drawn before the temple of the Night,

When the day-worn Sun has passed within;

Had seen the little body, whitely gowned,

Folded within its nest;

Had caught the last light kiss

Before the lips lay still;

And I had looked into the cool grey deep,

Where Sleep received the rose-leaf soul of her,

And bore it out upon her gentle waters.

Into the night I passed,

Where on the mellow bosom of the west

Floated the flame-lit shell of Hesperus;

And as I stayed with hallowed breath

The soul of fire fell over the rim of night:

And then I knew the soul of her I loved

Had heard the last clear call,

The low Elysian chant of Hesperus,

And loving me had borne the love I gave,

Out and beyond and over the ends of earth,

And where the altar flame of Venus burned,

Had laid the gift and breathed her Childhood's prayer.

The Poetry Journal             Robert Alden Sanborn

A Roman Doll

How an image of paint and wood

Leaped to her life with a love's control,

Struck the chords of her motherhood,

Passionate little mother-soul!

Fair to her sight were the stolid eyes,

Dear to her toil the robes empearled.

She crooned it the ancient lullabies,

She gathered it close from the outer world.

They watched together, as Nero's pyres

Fed the haze of a hundred fires.

Me in her fresh young arms she bore.

See, I am small,

Only a doll.

But I keep her kiss forevermore.

Long and lonely the toy has lain.

One by one into time's abyss

Years have dropped as the drops of rain.

Yet the cycles have left us this!

O red-lipped mother, O mother sweet,

Today a sister has heard you call,

I saw her weep o'er the crumbling doll.

She knew, she knew! You had lived and smiled!

You had loved your dream, little Roman child!

Me in her fresh young arms she bore.

See, I am small,

Only a doll.

But I keep her kiss forevermore.

The Poetry Journal                            Agnes Lee

Sappho

Midnight, and in the darkness not a sound;

So, with hushed breathing, sleeps the autumn night.

Only the white immortal stars shall know,

Here in the house by the low-linteled door,

How for the last time I have lit the lamp.

I think you are not wholly careless now,

Walls, that have sheltered me so many an hour,

Bed, that has brought me ecstasy and sleep,

Floors, that have borne me when a gale of joy

Lifted my soul and made me half a god.

Farewell; across the threshold many feet

Shall pass, but never Sappho's feet again.

Girls shall come in whom love has made aware

Of all their swaying beauty -- they shall sing,

But never Sappho's voice like golden fire

Shall seek for heaven thro' your echoing rafters;

There shall be sparrows bringing back the spring

Over the long blue meadows of the sea,

And south wind playing on the reeds of rain,

But never Sappho's whisper in the night,

Never her love-cry when the lover comes.

Farewell, I close hte door and make it fast.

.     .     .     .     .     .     .

The little street lies meek beneath the moon,

Running, as rivers run, to meet the sea.

I too go seaward and shall not return.

Oh, garlands on the door-posts that I pass,

Woven of asters and of autumn leaves,

I make a prayer for you: Cypris, be kind,

That every lover may be given love.

I shall not hasten lest the paving-stones

Should echo with my sandals and awake

Those who are warm beneath the cloak of sleep;

Lest they should rise and see me and should say:

"Whither goes Sappho lonely in the night?"

Whither goes Sappho? Whither all men go,

But they go driven, straining back with fear,

And Sappho goes as lightly as a leaf

Blown from brown autumn forests to the sea.

.     .     .     .     .     .     .

Here on the rock Zeus lifted from the waves,

I shall await the waking of the dawn,

Lying beneath the weight of dark as one

Lies breathless till the lover shall awake.

And with the sun, the sea shall cover me;

I shall be less than the dissolving foam,

Murmuring and melting on the ebbing tide.

I shall be less than spindrift, less than shells --

And yet I shall be greater than the gods;

For destiny no more can bow my soul

As rain bows down the watch-fires on the hills.

Yea, if my soul escape, it shall aspire

Toward the white heaven as flame that has its will.

I go not bitterly, not dumb with grief,

Not broken by the ache of love -- I go

As one grown tired lies down and hopes to sleep.

Yet they shall say: "It was for Cercolas --

She died because she could not bear her love."

They shall remember how we used to walk

Here on the cliff beneath the olearnders,

In the long limpid twilight of the spring,

Looking toward Khios where the amber sky

Was pierced by the faint arrow of a star.

How should they know the wind of a new beauty

Sweeping my soul had winnowed it with song?

I have been glad tho' love should come or go,

Happy as trees that find a wind to sway them,

Happy again when it has left them rest.

Others shall say: "Grave Dica wrought her death."

She would not lift her lips to take a kiss,

Or ever lift her eyes to take a smile.

She was a pool the winter paves with ice,

That the wild hunter in the hills must leave

With thirst unslaked in the brief southward sun.

Ah, Dica, it is not for thee I go.

And not for Phaon, tho' his ship lifts sail

Here in the windless harbor, for the south.

Oh, darkling deities that guard the Nile,

Watch over one whose gods are far away;

Egypt, be kind to him, -- his eyes are deep.

Yet they are wrong who say, it was for him.

How should they know that Sappho lived and died

Faithful to love, not faithful to the lover,

Never transfused and lost in what she loved,

Never so wholly loving nor at peace.

I asked for something greater than I found,

And very time that love has made me weep,

I have rejoiced that love could be so strong;

For I have stood apart and watched my soul

Caught in the gust of passion, as a bird

With baffled wings agains the dusty whirlwind

Struggle and frees itself to find the sky.

.     .     .     .     .     .     .

It is not for a single god, I go.

I have grown weary of the winds of heaven.

I will not be a reed to hold the sound

Of whatsoever breath the gods may blow,

Turning my torment into music for them.

They gave me life -- the gift was bountiful,

I lived with the swift singing strength of fire,

Seeking for beauty as a flame for fuel,

Beauty in all things in every hour.

The gods have given life, I gave them song;

The debt is paid and now I turn to go.

The breath of dawn blows the stars out like lamps,

There is a rim of silver on the sea.

As one grown tired, who hopes to sleep, I go.

Scribner's                                    Sara Teasdale

Of Moira Up the Glen

It's little that I'd care for the glories of Ireland,

Waiting for the shadows to gather in the glen,

Come the time of darkness, sitting by the hearth-light,

Whispering with bated breath for fear the little men

Should catch us and spell us to serve them for a year's time,

Toiling and moiling within a faëry snare.

I'm thinkin' 'twould be fearsome in the gray misty strangeness. --

'Tis hiding we'll be in the clear free air!

The sunlight above us, and willow hedge for shelter,

A tangle of soft things to rustle by the stream,

Where Moira, my white dove, whose beauty is my sorrow,

Would sit with me and travel on the long bright dream,

Travel with the water from the mountain to the meadow,

Down across the lowlands and gaily to the sea,

Out beyond the breakers to the shimmer of a far line

Poised and trembling within the heart of me.

What shall I murmur to coax the dream of beauty

Out from the shadows to welcome in the dawn?

How shall I sing it that she may know the glory,

Know it and come by the first flush of morn?

The moonlight is dark light, 'tis fear I'm after feelin',

The fairies should be in it and steal her heart away,

A goblet for their feasting, they'd drain it and fill it

With dreams of a far world beyond the light of day.

It's God's light I'm wanting, and Moira to see it,

See it and tremble with the love of God,

And seeing it she'd turn, and look within my own eyes,

And wonder at the vision transforming a sod

Into worshipful silence and thought that is living,

Burning and shaped by the warmth of its fire

To a chalice of tears and of laughter for singing

The lovely unfolding of dream-purged desire.

Smart Set                                    Edward J. O'Brien

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