Later Poems Part 7

Is the same stuff as you and I-- With knowledge and desire put by.

Thousands of times since time began It has been used for making man,

Freighted like us with every sense Of spirit and intelligence,

To walk the world and know the fine Large consciousness of things divine.

These wandering atoms in their day Perhaps have pa.s.sed this very way,

With eager step and flowerlike face, With lovely ardor, poise, and grace,

On what delightful errands bent, Pa.s.sionate, generous, and intent,--

An angel still, though veiled and gloved, Made to love us and to be loved.

Friends, when the summons comes for me To turn my back (reluctantly)

On this delightful play, I claim Only one thing in friends.h.i.+p's name;

And you will not decline a task So slight, when it is all I ask:

Scatter my ashes in the street Where avenue and crossway meet.

I beg you of your charity, No granite and cement for me,

To needlessly perpetuate An unimportant name and date.

Others may wish to lay them down On some fair hillside far from town,

Where slim white birches wave and gleam Beside a shadowy woodland stream,

Or in luxurious beds of fern, But I would have my dust return

To the one place it loved the best In days when it was happiest.

To a Young Lady on Her Birthday

The marching years go by And brush your garment's hem.

The bandits by and by Will bid you go with them.

Trust not that caravan!

Old vagabonds are they; They'll rob you if they can, And make believe it's play.

Make the old robbers give Of all the spoils they bear,-- Their truth, to help you live,-- Their joy, to keep you fair.

Ask not for gauds nor gold, Nor fame that falsely rings; The foolish world grows old Caring for all these things.

Make all your sweet demands For happiness alone, And the years will fill your hands With treasures rarely known.

The Gift

I said to Life, "How comes it, With all this wealth in store, Of beauty, joy, and knowledge, Thy cry is still for more?

"Count all the years of striving To make thy burden less,-- The things designed and fas.h.i.+oned To gladden thy success!

"The treasures sought and gathered Thy lightest whim to please,-- The loot of all the ages, The spoil of all the seas!

"Is there no end of labor, No limit to thy need?

Must man go bowed forever In bondage to thy greed?"

With tears of pride and pa.s.sion She answered, "G.o.d above!

I only wait the asking, To spend it all for love!"

The Cry of the Hillborn

I am homesick for the mountains-- My heroic mother hills-- And the longing that is on me No solace ever stills.

I would climb to brooding summits With their old untarnished dreams, Cool my heart in forest shadows To the lull of falling streams;

Hear the innocence of aspens That babble in the breeze, And the fragrant sudden showers That patter on the trees.

I am lonely for my thrushes In their hermitage withdrawn, Toning the quiet transports Of twilight and of dawn.

I need the pure, strong mornings, When the soul of day is still, With the touch of frost that kindles The scarlet on the hill;

Lone trails and winding woodroads To outlooks wild and high, And the pale moon waiting sundown Where ledges cut the sky.

I dream of upland clearings Where cones of sumac burn, And gaunt and gray-mossed boulders Lie deep in beds of fern;

The gray and mottled beeches, The birches' satin sheen, The majesty of hemlocks Crowning the blue ravine.

My eyes dim for the skyline Where purple peaks aspire, And the forges of the sunset Flare up in golden fire.

There crests look down unheeding And see the great winds blow, Tossing the huddled tree-tops In gorges far below;

Where cloud-mists from the warm earth Roll up about their knees, And hang their filmy tatters Like prayers upon the trees.

I cry for night-blue shadows On plain and hill and dome,-- The spell of old enchantments, The sorcery of home.