Songs and Satires Part 2

"SO WE GREW TOGETHER"

Reading over your letters I find you wrote me "My dear boy," or at times "dear boy," and the envelope Said "master"--all as I had been your very son, And not the orphan whom you adopted.

Well, you were father to me! And I can recall The things you did for me or gave me: One time we rode in a box car to Springfield To see the greatest show on earth; And one time you gave me redtop boots, And one time a watch, and one time a gun.

Well, I grew to gawkiness with a voice Like a rooster trying to crow in August Hatched in April, we'll say.

And you went about wrapped up in silence With eyes aflame, and I heard little rumors Of what they were doing to you, and how They wronged you--and we were poor--so poor!

And I could not understand why you failed, And why if you did good things for the people The people did not sustain you.

And why you loved another woman than Aunt Susan, So it was whispered at school, and what could be baser, Or so little to be forgiven?...

They crowded you hard in those days.

But you fought like a wounded lion For yourself I know, but for us, for me.

At last you fell ill, and for months you tottered Around the streets as thin as death, Trying to earn our bread, your great eyes glowing And the silence around you like a shawl!

But something in you kept you up.

You grew well again and rosy with cheeks Like an Indian peach almost, and eyes Full of moonlight and sunlight, and a voice That sang, and a humor that warded The arrows off. But still between us There was reticence; you kept me away With a glittering hardness; perhaps you thought I kept you away--for I was moving In spheres you knew not, living through Beliefs you believed in no more, and ideals That were just mirrors of unrealities.

As a boy can be I was critical of you.

And reasons for your failures began to arise In my mind--I saw specific facts here and there With no philosophy at hand to weld them And synthesize them into one truth-- And a rush of the strength of youth Deluded me into thinking the world Was something so easily understood and managed While I knew it not at all in truth.

And an adolescent egotism Made me feel you did not know me Or comprehend the all that I was.

All this you divined....

So it went. And when I left you and pa.s.sed To the world, the city--still I see you With eyes averted, and feel your hand Limp with sorrow--you could not speak.

You thought of what I might be, and where Life would take me, and how it would end-- There was longer silence. A year or two Brought me closer to you. I saw the play now And the game somewhat and understood your fights And enmities, and hardnesses and silences, And wild humor that had kept you whole-- For your soul had made it as an ant.i.toxin To the world's infections. And you swung to me Closer than before--and a chums.h.i.+p began Between us....

What vital power was yours!

You never tired, or needed sleep, or had a pain, Or refused a delight. I loved the things now You had always loved, a winning horse, A roulette wheel, a contest of skill In games or sports ... long talks on the corner With men who have lived and tell you Things with a rich flavor of old wisdom or humor; A woman, a gla.s.s of whisky at a table Where the fatigue of life falls, and our reserves That wait for happiness come up in smiles, Laughter, gentle confidences. Here you were A man with youth, and I a youth was a man, Exulting in your braveries and delight in life.

How you knocked that scamp over at Harry Varnell's When he tried to take your chips! And how I, Who had thought the devil in cards as a boy, Loved to play with you now and watch you play; And watch the subtle mathematics of your mind Prophecy, divine the plays. Who was it In your ancestry that you harked back to And reproduced with such various gifts Of flesh and spirit, Anglo-Saxon, Celt?-- You with such rapid wit and powerful skill For catching illogic and whipping Error's Fanged head from the body?...

I was really ahead of you At this stage, with more self-consciousness Of what man is, and what life is at last, And how the spirit works, and by what laws, With what inevitable force. But still I was Behind you in that strength which in our youth, If ever we have it, squeezes all the nectar From the grapes. It seemed you'd never lose This power and sense of joy, but yet at times I saw another phase of you....

There was the day We rode together north of the old town, Past the old farm houses that I knew-- Past maple groves, and fields of corn in the shock, And fields of wheat with the fall green.

It was October, but the clouds were summer's, Lazily floating in a sky of June; And a few crows flying here and there, And a quail's call, and around us a great silence That held at its core old memories Of pioneers, and dead days, forgotten things!

I'll never forget how you looked that day. Your hair Was turning silver now, but still your eyes Burned as of old, and the rich olive glow In your cheeks shone, with not a line or wrinkle!-- You seemed to me perfection--a youth, a man!

And now you talked of the world with the old wit, And now of the soul--how such a man went down Through folly or wrong done by him, and how Man's death cannot end all, There must be life hereafter!...

As you were that day, as you looked and spoke, As the earth was, I hear as the soul of it all G.o.dard's _Dawn_, Dvorak's _Humoresque_, The Morris Dances, Mendelssohn's _Barcarole_, And old Scotch songs, _When the Kye Come Hame_, And _The Moon Had Climbed the Highest Hill_, The Musseta Waltz and Rudolph's Narrative; Your great brow seemed Beethoven's And the l.u.s.t of life in your face Cellini's, And your riotous fancy like Dumas.

I was nearer you now than ever before, And finding each other thus I see to-day How the human soul seeks the human soul And finds the one it seeks at last.

For you know you can open a window That looks upon embowered darkness, When the flowers sleep and the trees are still At Midnight, and no light burns in the room; And you can hide your b.u.t.terfly Somewhere in the room, but soon you will see A host of b.u.t.terfly mates Fluttering through the window to join Your b.u.t.terfly hid in the room.

It is somehow thus with souls....

This day then I understood it all: Your vital democracy and love of men And tolerance of life; and how the excess of these Had wrought your sorrows in the days When we were so poor, and the small of mind Spoke of your sins and your connivance With sinful men. You had lived it down, Had triumphed over them, and you had grown.

Prosperous in the world and had pa.s.sed Into an easy mastery of life and beyond the thought Of further conquests for things.

As the Brahmins say, no more you wors.h.i.+ped matter, Or scarcely ghosts, or even the G.o.ds With singleness of heart.

This day you wors.h.i.+ped Eternal Peace Or Eternal Flame, with scarce a laugh or jest To hide your wors.h.i.+p; and I understood, Seeing so many facets to you, why it was Blind Condon always smiled to hear your voice, And why it was in a greenroom years ago Booth turned to you, marking your face From all the rest, and said, "There is a man Who might play Hamlet--better still Oth.e.l.lo"; And why it was the women loved you; and the priest Could feed his body and soul together drinking A gla.s.s of beer and visiting with you....

Then something happened: Your face grew smaller, your brow more narrow, Dull fires burned in your eyes, Your body shriveled, you walked with a cynical shuffle, Your hands mixed the keys of life, You had become a discord.

A monstrous hatred consumed you-- You had suffered the greatest wrong of all, I knew and granted the wrong.

You had mounted up to sixty years, now breathing hard, And just at the time that honor belonged to you You were dishonored at the hands of a friend.

I wept for you, and still I wondered If all I had grown to see in you and find in you And love in you was just a fond illusion-- If after all I had not seen you aright as a boy: Barbaric, hard, suspicious, cruel, redeemed Alone by bubbling animal spirits-- Even these gone now, all of you smoke Laden with stinging gas and lethal vapor....

Then you came forth again like the sun after storm-- The deadly uric acid driven out at last Which had poisoned you and dwarfed your soul-- So much for soul!

The last time I saw you Your face was full of golden light, Something between flame and the richness of flesh.

You were yourself again, wholly yourself.

And oh, to find you again and resume Our understanding we had worked so long to reach-- You calm and luminant and rich in thought!

This time it seemed we said but "yes" or "no"-- That was enough; we smoked together And drank a gla.s.s of wine and watched The leaves fall sitting on the porch....

Then life whirled me away like a leaf, And I went about the crowded ways of New York.

And one night Alberta and I took dinner At a place near Fourteenth Street where the music Was like the sun on a breeze-swept lake When every wave is a patine of fire, And I thought of you not at all Looking at Alberta and watching her white teeth Bite off bits of Italian bread, And watching her smile and the wide pupils Of her eyes, electrified by wine And music and the touch of our hands Now and then across the table.

We went to her house at last.

And through a languorous evening.

Where no light was but a single candle, We circled about and about a pending theme Till at last we solved it suddenly in rapture Almost by chance; and when I left She followed me to the hall and leaned above The railing about the stair for the farewell kiss-- And I went into the open air ecstatically, With the stars in the s.p.a.ces of sky between The towering buildings, and the rush Of wheels and clang of bells, Still with the fragrance of her lips and cheeks And glinting hair about me, delicate And keen in spite of the open air.

And just as I entered the brilliant car Something said to me you are dead-- I had not thought of you, was not thinking of you.

But I knew it was true, as it was, For the telegram waited me at my room....

I didn't come back.

I could not bear to see the breathless breath Over your brow--nor look at your face-- However you fared or where To what victories soever-- Vanquished or seemingly vanquished!

RAIN IN MY HEART

There is a quiet in my heart Like one who rests from days of pain.

Outside, the sparrows on the roof Are chirping in the dripping rain.

Rain in my heart; rain on the roof; And memory sleeps beneath the gray And windless sky and brings no dreams Of any well remembered day.

I would not have the heavens fair, Nor golden clouds, nor breezes mild, But days like this, until my heart To loss of you is reconciled.

I would not see you. Every hope To know you as you were has ranged.

I, who am altered, would not find The face I loved so greatly changed.

THE LOOP

From State street bridge a snow-white glimpse of sea Beyond the river walled in by red buildings, O'ertopped by masts that take the sunset's gildings, Roped to the wharf till spring shall set them free.

Great floes make known how swift the river's current.

Out of the north sky blows a cutting wind.

Smoke from the stacks and engines in a torrent Whirls downward, by the eddying breezes thinned.

Enskyed are sign boards advertising soap, Tobacco, coal, transcontinental trains.

A tug is whistling, straining at a rope, Fixed to a dredge with derricks, scoops and cranes.

Down in the loop the blue-gray air enshrouds, As with a cyclops' cape, the man-made hills And towers of granite where the city crowds.

Above the din a copper's whistle shrills.

There is a smell of coffee and of spices.

We near the market place of trade's devices.