Poems and Songs Part 20

GOOD CHEER (1870) (See Note 49)

So let these songs their story tell To all who in the Northland dwell, Since many friends request it.

(That Finland's folk with them belong In the wide realm of Northern song, I grateful must attest it.)

I send these songs--and now I find Most of them have riot what my mind Has deepest borne and favored: Some are too hasty, some too brief, Some, long in stock, have come to grief, Some with raw youth are flavored.

I lived far more than e'er I sang; Thought, ire, and mirth unceasing rang Around me, where I guested; To be where loud life's battles call For me was well-nigh more than all My pen on page arrested.

What's true and strong has growing-room, And will perhaps eternal bloom, Without black ink's salvation, And he will be, who least it planned, But in life's surging dared to stand, The best bard for his nation.

I heard once of a Spanish feast: Within the ring a rustic beast, A horse, to fight was fated; In came a tiger from his cage, Who walked about, his foe to gauge, And crouching down, then waited.

The people clapped and laughed and cheered, The tiger sprang, the horse upreared, But none could see him bleeding; The tiger tumbling shrinks and backs Before the horse's rustic whacks, Lies on his head naught heeding.

Then men and women hooted, hissed, With glaring eyes and clenched fist Out o'er the balcony bending; With shouts the tiger's heart they tease, Their thirst for blood soon to appease, To onset new him sending.

The people clapped and laughed and cheered The tiger sprang, the horse upreared; No blood to see was given, For fortune held the horse too dear, To him the tiger could not near, In flying curves hoof-driven.

To say who won I will not try; For lo, this rustic horse am I, And on the conflict's going;-- The city, though, where it occurs, And where it cheers and laughter stirs, Is known without my showing.

I fight, but have no hate or spite, From what I love draw gladness bright, My right to wrath reserving.

It is my blood, my soul, that goes In every line of all my blows, And guides their course unswerving.

But as I stand here now to-day, Nor grudge nor vengeance can me sway, To think that foes I'm facing.

So in return some friends.h.i.+p give To one who for the _cause_ would live, With love the North embracing!

But first my poet-path shall be With veneration unto _thee_, Who fill'st the North with wonder; In wrath thou dawn didst prophesy Behind the North's dark morning-sky, That lightnings shook and thunder.

Then, milder, thou, by sea and slope, The fount of saga, faith, and hope Mad'st flow for every peasant;-- Now from the snow-years' mountain-side Thou seest with time's returning tide Thine own high image present.

To _thee_, then, in whose spring of song Finland's "the thousand lakes" belong And sound their thrilling sorrow:-- Our Northern soul forever heard Keeps watch and ward in poet's word 'Gainst Eastern millions' morrow.

But when I stand in our own home, One greets me from the starry dome With wealth of light and power.

There s.h.i.+nes he: HENRIK WERGELAND, Out over Norway's pallid strand In memory's clear hour.

OLD HELTBERG (See Note 50)

I went to a school that was little and proper, Both for church and for state a conventional hopper, Feeding rollers that ground out their grist unwaiting; And though it was clear from the gears' frequent grating They rarely with oil of the spirit were smeared, Yet no other school in that region appeared.

We _had_ to go there till older;--though sorry, I went there also,--but reveled in Snorre.

The self-same books, the same so-called education, That teacher after teacher, by decrees of power royal, Into cla.s.s after cla.s.s pounds with self-negation, And that only bring promotion to them that are loyal!-- The self-same books, the same so-called education, Quickly molding to one type all the men in the land, An excellent fellow who on _one_ leg can stand, And as runs an anchor-rope reel off his rote-narration!-- The self-same books, the same so-called education From Hammerfest to Mandal--('tis the state's creation Of an everything-and-every-one-conserving dominion, Wherein all the finer folk have but one opinion!)-- The self-same books, the same so-called education My comrades devoured; but my appet.i.te failed me, And that fare I refused, till, to cure what had ailed me, Home leaving I leaped o'er those bars of vexation.

What I met on the journey, what I thought in each case, What arose in my soul in the new-chosen place, Where the future was lying,--this to tell is refractory, But I'll give you a picture of the "student factory."

Full-bearded fellows of thirty near died of Their hunger for lore, as they slaved by the side of Rejected aspirants with faces hairless, Like sparrows in spring, scatter-brained and careless.

--Vigorous seamen whose adventurous mind First drove them from school that real life they might find-- But now to cruise wide on the sea they were craving, Where the flag of free thought o'er all life wide is waving.

--Bankrupted merchants who their books had wooed In their silent stores, till their creditors sued And took from them their goods. Now they studied "on credit."

Beside them dawdling dandies. Near in scorn have I said it!

--"Non-Latin" law-students, young and ambitious, "Prelims," theologs, with their preaching officious; --Cadets that in arm or in leg had a hurt; --Peasants late in learning but now in for a spurt:-- _Here_ they all wished through their Latin to drive In _one_ year or in two,--not in eight or in five.

They hung over benches, 'gainst the walls they were lying, In each window sat two, one the edge was just trying Of his new-sharpened knife on an ink-spattered desk.

Through two large open rooms what a spectacle grotesque!

At one end, half in dreams, Aasmund Olavsen Vinje's Long figure and spare, a contemplative genius; Thin and intense, with the color of gypsum, And a coal-black, preposterous beard, Henrik Ibsen.

I, the youngest of the lot, had to wait for company Till a new litter came in, after Yule Jonas Lie.

But the "boss" who ruled there with his logical rod, "Old Heltberg" himself, was of all the most odd!

In his jacket of dog's skin and fur-boots stout He waged a hard war with his asthma and gout.

No fur-cap could hide from us his forehead imperious, His cla.s.sical features, his eye's power mysterious.

Now erect in his might and now bowed by his pain, Strong thoughts he threw out, and he threw not in vain.

If the suffering grew keener and again it was faced By the will in his soul, and his body he braced Against onset after onset, then his eyes were flaming And his hands were clenched hard, as if deep were his shaming That he seemed to have yielded! Oh, then we were sharing Amazed all the grandeur of conflict, and bearing Home with us a symbol of the storms of that age, When "Wergeland's wild hunt" o'er our country could rage!

There was power in the men who took part in that play, There was will in the power that then broke its way.

Now alone he was left, forgotten in his corner:-- But in deeds was a hero,--let none dare to be his scorner!

He freed thought from the fetters that the schools inherit, Independent in teaching, he led by the spirit; Personality unique: for with manner anarchic He carved up the text; and absolute-monarchic Was his wrath at mistakes; but soon it subsided, Or, controlled, into n.o.blest pathos was guided, Which oft turned in recoil into self-irony And a downpour of wit letting no one go free.-- So he governed his "horde," so we went through the country, The fair land of the cla.s.sics, that we harried with effront'ry!

How Cicero, Sall.u.s.t, and Virgil stood in fear On the forum, in the temple, when we ravaging drew near!

'T was again. the Goths' invasion to the ruin of Rome, It was Thor's and Odin's spirit over Jupiter's home, --And the old man's "grammar" was a dwarf-forged hammer, When he swung it and smote with sparks, flames, and clamor.

The herd of "barbarians" he thus headed on their way Had no purpose to settle and just there to stay.

"Non-Latins" they remained, by no alien thought enslaved, And found their true selves, as the foreign foes they braved.

In conquering the language we learned the laws of thought, And following him, his fine longing we caught For wanderings and wonders, all the conqueror's zeal, To win unknown lands and their mysteries reveal.

Each lesson seemed a vision that henceforth was ours, Inspiring each youth's individual powers.

His pictures made pregnant our creative desire, His wit was our testing in an ordeal of fire, His wisdom was our balance, to weigh things great and small, His pathos told of pa.s.sions, burning, but held in thrall,

Oft the stricken hero scarce his tedious toil could brook, He wished to go and write, though it were but a single book, To show a _little_ what he was, and show it to the world: He loosed his cable daily, but ne'er his sails unfurled.

His "grammar" was not printed! And he pa.s.sed from mortal ken To where the laws of thought are not written with a pen.

His "grammar" was not printed! But the life that it had, In ink's prolonging power did not need to be clad.

It lived in his soul, so mighty, so warm, That a thousand books' life seems but poor empty form.

It lives in a host of independent men, To whose thought he gave life and who give it again In the school, at the bar, in the church, and Storting's hall, In poetry and art,--whose deeds and lifework all Have proved to be the freer and the broader in their might, Because Heltberg had given their youth higher flight.

FOR THE WOUNDED (1871) (See Note 51)

A still procession goes Amid the battle's booming, Its arm the red cross shows; It prays in many forms of speech, And, bending o'er the fallen, Brings peace and home to each.

Not only is it found Where bleed the wounds of battle, But all the world around.

It is the love the whole world feels In n.o.ble hearts and tender, While gentle pity kneels;--

It is all labor's dread Of war's mad waste and murder, Praying that peace may spread; It is all sufferers who heed The sighing of a brother, And know his sorrow's need;--

It is each groan of pain Heard from the sick and wounded, 'T is Christian prayer humane; It is their cry who lonely grope, 'T is the oppressed man's moaning, The dying breath of hope;--

This rainbow-bridge of prayers Up through the world's wild tempest In light of Christ's faith bears: That love and loving deeds May conquer strife and pa.s.sion; For thus His promise reads.

LANDFALL (See Note 52)