A Few More Verses. Coolidge Susan

      I WOULD be free! For freedom is all fair,

      And her strong smile is like the smile of God.

      Her voice rings out like trumpet on the air,

      And men rise up and follow; though the road

      Be all unknown and hard to understand,

      They tread it gladly, holding Freedom’s hand.

      I would be free! The little spark of Heaven

      Let in my soul when life was breathed in me

      Is like a flame, this way and that way driven

      By ever wavering winds, which ceaselessly

      Kindle and blow till all my soul is hot.

      And would consume if liberty were not.

      I would be free! But what is freedom, then?

      For widely various are the shapes she wears

      In different ages and to different men;

      And many titles, many forms she bears, —

      Riot and revolution, sword and flame,

      All called in turn by Freedom’s honored name.

      I would be free! Not free to burn and spoil,

      To trample down the weak and smite the strong,

      To seize the larger share of wine and oil,

      And rob the sun my daylight to prolong,

      And rob the night of sleep while others wake, —

      Feast on their famine, basely free to take.

      I would be free! Free in a dearer way,

      Free to become all that I may or can;

      To be my best and utmost self each day,

      Not held or bound by any chain of man,

      By dull convention, or by foolish sneer,

      Or love’s mistaken clasp of feeble fear.

      Free to be kind and true and faithful; free

      To do the happy thing that makes life good,

      To grow as grows the goodly forest-tree;

      By none gainsaid, by none misunderstood,

      To taste life’s freshness with a child’s delight,

      And find new joy in every day and night.

      I would be free! Ah! so may all be free.

      Then shall the world grow sweet at core and sound.

      And, moved in blest and ordered circuit, see

      The bright millennial sun rise fair and round,

      Heaven’s day begin, and Christ, whose service is

      Freedom all perfect, rule the world as his.

      THE trance of golden afternoon

      Lay on the Judæan skies;

      The trance of vision, like a swoon,

      Sealed the Apostle’s eyes.

      Upon the roof he sat and saw

      Angelic hands let down and draw

      Again the mighty vessel full

      Of beasts and birds innumerable.

      Three times the heavenly vision fell,

      Three times the Lord’s voice spoke;

      When Peter, loath to break the spell,

      Roused from his trance, and woke,

      To hear a common sound and rude,

      Which jarred and shook his solitude, —

      A knocking at the doorway near,

      Where stood the two from Cæsarea.

      And should he heed, or should he stay?

      Scarce had the vision fled, —

      Perchance it might return that day,

      Perchance more words be said

      By the Lord’s voice? – he rises slow;

      Again the knocking; he must go;

      Nor guessed, while going down the stair,

      That ’twas the Lord who called him there.

      Had he sat still upon the roof,

      Wooing the vision long,

      The Gentile world had missed the truth,

      And Heaven one “sweet new song.”

      Souls might have perished in blind pain,

      And the Lord Christ have died in vain

      For them. He knew not what it meant,

      But Peter rose and Peter went.

      Oh, souls which sit in upper air,

      Longing for heavenly sight,

      Glimpses of truth all fleeting-fair,

      Set in unearthly light, —

      Is there no knocking heard below,

      For which you should arise and go,

      Leaving the vision, and again

      Bearing its message unto men?

      Sordid the world were vision not,

      But fruitless were your stay;

      So, having seen the sight, and got

      The message, haste away.

      Though pure and bright thy higher air,

      And hot the street and dull the stair,

      Still get thee down, for who shall know

      But ’tis the Lord who knocks below?

      ALWAYS when the roses bloom most brightly,

      Some sad heart is sure to presage blight;

      Always when the breeze is kindliest blowing

      There are eyes that look out for a gale;

      Always when the bosom’s lord sits lightly

      Comes some croaking proverb to affright,

      And in sweetest music grieving blindly

      Sits the shadow of a sorrow pale.

      Though to-day says not a word to sadden,

      Still to-morrow’s menace fills my ear.

      Less intent on this than that I hie me,

      Fearful, eager, all the worst to know,

      Missing that which might the moment gladden,

      For the prescience of a far-off fear,

      Which again and yet again flits by me,

      Clouding all the sunshine as I go.

      There is

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