102A feeling of sadness and longing, That is not akin to pain,
And resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles the rain. Come, read to me some poem, Some simple and heartfelt lay,
That shall soothe this restless feeling, And banish the thoughts of day.
Not from the grand old masters, Not from the bards sublime, Whose distant footsteps echo Through the corridors of Time. For, like strains of martial music, Their mighty thoughts suggest Life's endless toil and endeavor; And tonight I long for rest.
Read from some humbler poet, Whose songs gushed from his heart,
As showers from the clouds of summer, Or tears from the eyelids start;
Who, through long days of labor, And nights devoid of ease,
Still heard in his soul the music
Of wonderful melodies.
Such songs have power to quiet
The restless pulse of care, And come like the benediction That follows after prayer.
Then read from the treasured volume
The poem of thy choice,
And lend to the rhyme of the poet
The beauty of thy voice.
And the night shall be filled with music
And the cares, that infest the day, Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs, And as silently steal away. AFTERNOON IN FEBRUARY
The day is ending,
The night is descending; The marsh is frozen,
The river dead.
Through clouds like ashes
The red sun flashes On village windows That glimmer red.
The snow recommences; The buried fences
Mark no longer
The road o'er the plain; While through the meadows, Like fearful shadows,
Slowly passes
A funeral train. The bell is pealing, And every feeling Within me responds To the dismal knell;
103
Shadows are trailing, My heart is bewailing And tolling within Like a funeral bell.
TO AN OLD DANISH SONG-BOOK
Welcome, my old friend, Welcome to a foreign fireside, While the sullen gales of autumn Shake the windows.
The ungrateful world
Has, it seems, dealt harshly with thee, Since, beneath the skies of Denmark, First I met thee.
There are marks of age,
There are thumb-marks on thy margin, Made by hands that clasped thee rudely, At the alehouse.
Soiled and dull thou art;
Yellow are thy time-worn pages, As the russet, rain-molested Leaves of autumn.
Thou art stained with wine Scattered from hilarious goblets, As the leaves with the libations Of Olympus.
Yet dost thou recall
Days departed, half-forgotten, When in dreamy youth I wandered By the Baltic,--
When I paused to hear
The old ballad of King Christian Shouted from suburban taverns In the twilight.
Thou recallest bards,
Who in solitary chambers,
And with hearts by passion wasted, Wrote thy pages.
Thou recallest homes
Where thy songs of love and friendship Made the gloomy Northern winter Bright as summer.
Once some ancient Scald,
In his bleak, ancestral Iceland, Chanted staves of these old ballads To the Vikings.
Once in Elsinore,
At the court of old King Hamlet Yorick and his boon companions Sang these ditties.
Once Prince Frederick's Guard
Sang them in their smoky barracks;-- Suddenly the English cannon
Joined the chorus!
Peasants in the field,
Sailors on the roaring ocean, Students, tradesmen, pale mechanics, All have sung them.
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Thou hast been their friend;
They, alas! have left thee friendless! Yet at least by one warm fireside Art thou welcome.
And, as swallows build
In these wide, old-fashioned chimneys, So thy twittering songs shall nestle
In my bosom,--
Quiet, close, and warm, Sheltered from all molestation, And recalling by their voices Youth and travel.
WALTER VON DER VOGELWEID
Vogelweid the Minnesinger,
When he left this world of ours, Laid his body in the cloister,
Under Wurtzburg's minster towers. And he gave the monks his treasures, Gave them all with this behest:
They should feed the birds at noontide
Daily on his place of rest;
Saying, "From these wandering minstrels
I have learned the art of song; Let me now repay the lessons
They have taught so well and long." Thus the bard of love departed;
And, fulfilling his desire,
On his tomb the birds were feasted
By the children of the choir.
Day by day, o'er tower and turret, In foul weather and in fair,
Day by day, in vaster numbers, Flocked the poets of the air.
On the tree whose heavy branches
Overshadowed all the place,
On the pavement, on the tombstone, On the poet's sculptured face,
On the cross-bars of each window, On the lintel of each door,
They renewed the War of Wartburg, Which the bard had fought before. There they sang their merry carols, Sang
