No More Learning

Do hundreds play thee, or does but one play?

Are there in all great cities tempest-tossed
Men who would seek the rivers but for thee,

Who, but for thee, would be forever lost?
Why drifts thy lonely voice always to me?
Why am I the neighbour always
Of those who force to sing thy trembling strings?
Life is more heavy--thy song says--
Than the vast, heavy burden of all things.




SONG OF THE STATUE


Who so loveth me that he
Will give his precious life for me?
I shall be set free from the stone
If some one drowns for me in the sea,
I shall have life, life of my own,--
For life I ache.

I long for the singing blood,
The stone is so still and cold.
I dream of life, life is good.
Will no one love me and be bold
And me awake?

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I weep and weep alone,
Weep always for my stone.
What joy is my blood to me
If it ripens like red wine?
It cannot call back from the sea
The life that was given for mine,
Given for Love's sake.




MAIDENS. I


Others must by a long dark way
Stray to the mystic bards,
Or ask some one who has heard them sing
Or touch the magic chords.
Only the maidens question not
The bridges that lead to Dream;
Their luminous smiles are like strands of pearls
On a silver vase agleam.

The maidens' doors of Life lead out
Where the song of the poet soars,
And out beyond to the great world--
To the world beyond the doors.




MAIDENS. II


Maidens the poets learn from you to tell
How solitary and remote you are,
As night is lighted by one high bright star
They draw light from the distance where you dwell.

For poet you must always maiden be
Even though his eyes the woman in you wake
Wedding brocade your fragile wrists would break,
Mysterious, elusive, from him flee.

Within his garden let him wait alone
Where benches stand expectant in the shade
Within the chamber where the lyre was played
Where he received you as the eternal One.

Go! It grows dark--your voice and form no more
His senses seek; he now no longer sees
A white robe fluttering under dark beech trees
Along the pathway where it gleamed before.

He loves the long paths where no footfalls ring,
And he loves much the silent chamber where
Like a soft whisper through the quiet air
He hears your voice, far distant, vanishing.

The softly stealing echo comes again
From crowds of men whom, wearily, he shuns;
And many see you there--so his thought runs--
And tenderest memories are pierced with pain.




THE BRIDE


Call me, Beloved! Call aloud to me!
Thy bride her vigil at the window keeps;
The evening wanes to dusk, the dimness creeps
Down empty alleys of the old plane-tree.

O! Let thy voice enfold me close about,
Or from this dark house, lonely and remote,
Through deep blue gardens where gray shadows float
I will pour forth my soul with hands stretched out . .