pain,
When love beneath the feet of passion creeps,
Ah me, what do we gain?
When we our rosy bower to demons lease,
When Life’s most tender strains by shrieks are slain,
When strife invades our quietude and peace,
Ah me, what do we gain?
When we allow the herbs of hate to sprout,
When weeds of jealousy the lily stain,
When pearls of faith are crushed by stones of doubt,
Ah me, what do we gain?
When night creeps on us in the light of day,
When we nepenthes of good cheer disdain,
When on the throne of courage sits dismay,
Ah me, what do we gain?
When sweetness, goodness, kindness all have died,
When naught but broken, bleeding hearts remain,
When rough-shod o’er our better self we ride,
Ah me, what do we gain?
O, Give Me Strength to Take
Thy love’s as tender as the drooping rose that sadly says to earth:
“No more have I the strength to take what thou giv’st me;”
But unlike her, alas, thy love’s complaint of dearth:
“Thou hast no strength to give what I demand of thee.”
Thy love hath heard the many whispered promises of every soul;
His birth methinks is nigh coeval with the birth of time:
He lives in death throughout the ages, and his goal
Is hidden in the faded flowers from every clime.
His soul is deeper than the sea and deepest caverns in its bed;
’T is higher than the highest sky above our own;
’T is purer than the morning dew a-dripping from the salvias red;
’T is mightier than the four winds, blowing from every zone.
This love hath offered me the keys of all his halls and towers,
And to my heart with clinging kisses he appealed;
But, ah, forgive me God! must I the sweetest flowers
Refuse because they do not grow in Beauty’s field?
Near the Cascades
Hold back thy lips, I pray;
Just let me rest this way;
My soul is in the spray
Arising from the silvery cascades murmuring farewell to the day.
Thy kisses ’neath a sigh
Of mine extinguished lie;
O friend, I choke, I die:
Pray, let me raise my head to see the parting light, the vivid sky,
If every kiss of thine
Is safely kept with mine
For one for whom I pine,
Wouldst thou, contented with the taking, call my love a love divine?
Ay, and for every tear
Thou sheddest when I’m near
I shed a score to hear
Her echo my desire’s sigh, albeit she is not thy peer.
If I were but a reed,
Or but a fern or weed,
This would not be my creed;
But prick thou these cold slips and all the roots of me in heaven will bleed.
Thy burning breath is creeping
All over me; ’t is leaping
Into my bones and sweeping
Their ashes out, up and into mine eyes, alas! the awful reaping.
No longer do I fear,
Nor see, nor feel, nor hear;
No longer am I near;
If thou wilt quench thy flame, kiss now the lips that were to thee so dear.
As well kiss thou the grass
On which I lay, alas!
Like me, thou too wilt pass;
One kiss will turn thy lips to ashes and one tear, thine eyes to glass.
Beneath this hemlock tree
A clod I leave to thee;
But over land and sea
My soul is rising, rising, rising, searching for the gods that be.
But gods have lived, and lied,
And loved, and fell, and died;
And like me too they cried
For mercy at the snow white feet of Beauty’s daughter, Beauty’s bride.
And when from Beauty’s spell
Her soul is free, she’ll dwell
In mine, the storm to quell;
In mine she’ll rise to realms of bliss, or swiftly whirl into the deepest hell.
Onward Keep
Onward keep! Forget the self that cried:
“This world’s a forest choked with ice and snow;
No spark of fire through it can ever ride,
No human flame in it can ever glow.”
And keeping onward, now, I find
The golden leaves of yesterday
All safely hidden from the wind
Beneath the snow that melts away,
And on the shivering boughs
New leaves and tender sprout;
They crown the winter’s brows,
And laugh away his doubt.
And in the brook
The echoes of
What I forsook—
What I did love.
And the frost
’Neath the breath
Of me must
Welcome death;
And the heat
Left behind
Guides the feet
Of the blind.
Onward keep;
Laugh and weep;
Pain and joy
Hide and peep.
Rise and fall—
Fall and rise;
This is all—
This is wise.
Allah wa Ana
Though I’m God, thou art man, we are one,
We are all and we shall ever be;
Though the light of my sky thou didst shun,
Thou shalt love me ere thy course is run,
As forever I live loving thee.
Thou art mine, I am thine and the fire
Of my breath all thy regions shall warm,
Ere the life in thy soil shall expire,
Ere the seeds of thy basest desire
From their prison break out and take form.
Thou wilt doubt and deny me forsooth
And rejoice in thy vanity’s power;
Thou wilt die on the breast of my truth,
In the end thou wilt laugh at thy youth,
And its wine although old will be sour.
I was with thee when thou didst deny,
As I am with thy mother at prayer;
I was with thee when thou didst defy
My hell and my earth and my sky,
And I love none the less those that dare.
In the yogi’s pagoda I am;
In the fire of the magi I was;
To the sons of Abraheem and Sham
And their foes and to thee I undam
All the banks of my veins on the cross.
Through the spheres and the primitive throngs
I came down and I struggled with thee;
Through the ages I sing in thy songs,
But I leave thee to rise on thy wrongs;—
Thou shalt rise and thou shalt live in me.
In Memory of E.
