The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes Part 23

When the first larvae on the elm are seen, The crawling wretches, like its leaves, are green; Ere chill October shakes the latest down, They, like the foliage, change their tint to brown; On the blue flower a bluer flower you spy, You stretch to pluck it--'tis a b.u.t.terfly; The flattened tree-toads so resemble bark, They're hard to find as Ethiops in the dark; The woodc.o.c.k, stiffening to fict.i.tious mud, Cheats the young sportsman thirsting for his blood; So by long living on a single lie, Nay, on one truth, will creatures get its dye; Red, yellow, green, they take their subject's hue,-- Except when squabbling turns them black and blue!

OUR LIMITATIONS

WE trust and fear, we question and believe, From life's dark threads a trembling faith to weave, Frail as the web that misty night has spun, Whose dew-gemmed awnings glitter in the sun.

While the calm centuries spell their lessons out, Each truth we conquer spreads the realm of doubt; When Sinai's summit was Jehovah's throne, The chosen Prophet knew his voice alone; When Pilate's hall that awful question heard, The Heavenly Captive answered not a word.

Eternal Truth! beyond our hopes and fears Sweep the vast orbits of thy myriad spheres!

From age to age, while History carves sublime On her waste rock the flaming curves of time, How the wild swayings of our planet show That worlds unseen surround the world we know.

THE OLD PLAYER

THE curtain rose; in thunders long and loud The galleries rung; the veteran actor bowed.

In flaming line the telltales of the stage Showed on his brow the autograph of age; Pale, hueless waves amid his cl.u.s.tered hair, And umbered shadows, prints of toil and care; Round the wide circle glanced his vacant eye,-- He strove to speak,--his voice was but a sigh.

Year after year had seen its short-lived race Flit past the scenes and others take their place; Yet the old prompter watched his accents still, His name still flaunted on the evening's bill.

Heroes, the monarchs of the scenic floor, Had died in earnest and were heard no more; Beauties, whose cheeks such roseate bloom o'er-spread They faced the footlights in unborrowed red, Had faded slowly through successive shades To gray duennas, foils of younger maids; Sweet voices lost the melting tones that start With Southern throbs the st.u.r.dy Saxon heart, While fresh sopranos shook the painted sky With their long, breathless, quivering locust-cry.

Yet there he stood,--the man of other days, In the clear present's full, unsparing blaze, As on the oak a faded leaf that clings While a new April spreads its burnished wings.

How bright yon rows that soared in triple tier, Their central sun the flas.h.i.+ng chandelier!

How dim the eye that sought with doubtful aim Some friendly smile it still might dare to claim How fresh these hearts! his own how worn and cold!

Such the sad thoughts that long-drawn sigh had told.

No word yet faltered on his trembling tongue; Again, again, the cras.h.i.+ng galleries rung.

As the old guardsman at the bugle's blast Hears in its strain the echoes of the past, So, as the plaudits rolled and thundered round, A life of memories startled at the sound.

He lived again,--the page of earliest days,-- Days of small fee and parsimonious praise; Then lithe young Romeo--hark that silvered tone, From those smooth lips--alas! they were his own.

Then the bronzed Moor, with all his love and woe, Told his strange tale of midnight melting snow; And dark--plumed Hamlet, with his cloak and blade, Looked on the royal ghost, himself a shade.

All in one flash, his youthful memories came, Traced in bright hues of evanescent flame, As the spent swimmer's in the lifelong dream, While the last bubble rises through the stream.

Call him not old, whose visionary brain Holds o'er the past its undivided reign.

For him in vain the envious seasons roll Who bears eternal summer in his soul.

If yet the minstrel's song, the poet's lay, Spring with her birds, or children at their play, Or maiden's smile, or heavenly dream of art, Stir the few life-drops creeping round his heart, Turn to the record where his years are told,-- Count his gray hairs,--they cannot make him old!

What magic power has changed the faded mime?

One breath of memory on the dust of time.

As the last window in the b.u.t.tressed wall Of some gray minster tottering to its fall, Though to the pa.s.sing crowd its hues are spread, A dull mosaic, yellow, green, and red, Viewed from within, a radiant glory shows When through its pictured screen the sunlight flows, And kneeling pilgrims on its storied pane See angels glow in every shapeless stain; So streamed the vision through his sunken eye, Clad in the splendors of his morning sky.

All the wild hopes his eager boyhood knew, All the young fancies riper years proved true, The sweet, low-whispered words, the winning glance From queens of song, from Houris of the dance, Wealth's lavish gift, and Flattery's soothing phrase, And Beauty's silence when her blush was praise, And melting Pride, her lashes wet with tears, Triumphs and banquets, wreaths and crowns and cheers, Pangs of wild joy that perish on the tongue, And all that poets dream, but leave unsung!

In every heart some viewless founts are fed From far-off hillsides where the dews were shed; On the worn features of the weariest face Some youthful memory leaves its hidden trace, As in old gardens left by exiled kings The marble basins tell of hidden springs, But, gray with dust, and overgrown with weeds, Their choking jets the pa.s.ser little heeds, Till time's revenges break their seals away, And, clad in rainbow light, the waters play.

Good night, fond dreamer! let the curtain fall The world's a stage, and we are players all.

A strange rehearsal! Kings without their crowns, And threadbare lords, and jewel-wearing clowns, Speak the vain words that mock their throbbing hearts, As Want, stern prompter! spells them out their parts.

The tinselled hero whom we praise and pay Is twice an actor in a twofold play.

We smile at children when a painted screen Seems to their simple eyes a real scene; Ask the poor hireling, who has left his throne To seek the cheerless home he calls his own, Which of his double lives most real seems, The world of solid fact or scenic dreams?

Canvas, or clouds,--the footlights, or the spheres,-- The play of two short hours, or seventy years?

Dream on! Though Heaven may woo our open eyes, Through their closed lids we look on fairer skies; Truth is for other worlds, and hope for this; The cheating future lends the present's bliss; Life is a running shade, with fettered hands, That chases phantoms over s.h.i.+fting sands; Death a still spectre on a marble seat, With ever clutching palms and shackled feet; The airy shapes that mock life's slender chain, The flying joys he strives to clasp in vain, Death only grasps; to live is to pursue,-- Dream on! there 's nothing but illusion true!

A POEM

DEDICATION OF THE PITTSFIELD CEMETERY, SEPTEMBER 9,1850

ANGEL of Death! extend thy silent reign!

Stretch thy dark sceptre o'er this new domain No sable car along the winding road Has borne to earth its unresisting load; No sudden mound has risen yet to show Where the pale slumberer folds his arms below; No marble gleams to bid his memory live In the brief lines that hurrying Time can give; Yet, O Destroyer! from thy shrouded throne Look on our gift; this realm is all thine own!

Fair is the scene; its sweetness oft beguiled From their dim paths the children of the wild; The dark-haired maiden loved its gra.s.sy dells, The feathered warrior claimed its wooded swells, Still on its slopes the ploughman's ridges show The pointed flints that left his fatal bow, Chipped with rough art and slow barbarian toil,-- Last of his wrecks that strews the alien soil!

Here spread the fields that heaped their ripened store Till the brown arms of Labor held no more; The scythe's broad meadow with its dusky blush; The sickle's harvest with its velvet flush; The green-haired maize, her silken tresses laid, In soft luxuriance, on her harsh brocade; The gourd that swells beneath her tossing plume; The coa.r.s.er wheat that rolls in lakes of bloom,-- Its coral stems and milk-white flowers alive With the wide murmurs of the scattered hive; Here glowed the apple with the pencilled streak Of morning painted on its southern cheek; The pear's long necklace strung with golden drops, Arched, like the banian, o'er its pillared props; Here crept the growths that paid the laborer's care With the cheap luxuries wealth consents to spare; Here sprang the healing herbs which could not save The hand that reared them from the neighboring grave.

Yet all its varied charms, forever free From task and tribute, Labor yields to thee No more, when April sheds her fitful rain, The sower's hand shall cast its flying grain; No more, when Autumn strews the flaming leaves, The reaper's band shall gird its yellow sheaves; For thee alike the circling seasons flow Till the first blossoms heave the latest snow.

In the stiff clod below the whirling drifts, In the loose soil the springing herbage lifts, In the hot dust beneath the parching weeds, Life's withering flower shall drop its shrivelled seeds; Its germ entranced in thy unbreathing sleep Till what thou sowest mightier angels reap!

Spirit of Beauty! let thy graces blend With loveliest Nature all that Art can lend.

Come from the bowers where Summer's life-blood flows Through the red lips of June's half-open rose, Dressed in bright hues, the loving suns.h.i.+ne's dower; For tranquil Nature owns no mourning flower.

Come from the forest where the beech's screen Bars the fierce moonbeam with its flakes of green; Stay the rude axe that bares the shadowy plains, Stanch the deep wound That dries the maple's veins.

Come with the stream whose silver-braided rills Fling their unclasping bracelets from the hills, Till in one gleam, beneath the forest's wings, Melts the white glitter of a hundred springs.

Come from the steeps where look majestic forth From their twin thrones the Giants of the North On the huge shapes, that, crouching at their knees, Stretch their broad shoulders, rough with s.h.a.ggy trees.

Through the wide waste of ether, not in vain, Their softened gaze shall reach our distant plain; There, while the mourner turns his aching eyes On the blue mounds that print the bluer skies, Nature shall whisper that the fading view Of mightiest grief may wear a heavenly hue.

Cherub of Wisdom! let thy marble page Leave its sad lesson, new to every age; Teach us to live, not grudging every breath To the chill winds that waft us on to death, But ruling calmly every pulse it warms, And tempering gently every word it forms.

Seraph of Love! in heaven's adoring zone, Nearest of all around the central throne, While with soft hands the pillowed turf we spread That soon shall hold us in its dreamless bed, With the low whisper,--Who shall first be laid In the dark chamber's yet unbroken shade?-- Let thy sweet radiance s.h.i.+ne rekindled here, And all we cherish grow more truly dear.

Here in the gates of Death's o'erhanging vault, Oh, teach us kindness for our brother's fault Lay all our wrongs beneath this peaceful sod, And lead our hearts to Mercy and its G.o.d.

FATHER of all! in Death's relentless claim We read thy mercy by its sterner name; In the bright flower that decks the solemn bier, We see thy glory in its narrowed sphere; In the deep lessons that affliction draws, We trace the curves of thy encircling laws; In the long sigh that sets our spirits free, We own the love that calls us back to Thee!

Through the hushed street, along the silent plain, The spectral future leads its mourning train, Dark with the shadows of uncounted bands, Where man's white lips and woman's wringing hands Track the still burden, rolling slow before, That love and kindness can protect no more; The smiling babe that, called to mortal strife, Shuts its meek eyes and drops its little life; The drooping child who prays in vain to live, And pleads for help its parent cannot give; The pride of beauty stricken in its flower; The strength of manhood broken in an hour; Age in its weakness, bowed by toil and care, Traced in sad lines beneath its silvered hair.

The sun shall set, and heaven's resplendent spheres Gild the smooth turf unhallowed yet by tears, But ah! how soon the evening stars will shed Their sleepless light around the slumbering dead!

Take them, O Father, in immortal trust!

Ashes to ashes, dust to kindred dust, Till the last angel rolls the stone away, And a new morning brings eternal day!

TO GOVERNOR SWAIN

DEAR GOVERNOR, if my skiff might brave The winds that lift the ocean wave, The mountain stream that loops and swerves Through my broad meadow's channelled curves Should waft me on from bound to bound To where the River weds the Sound, The Sound should give me to the Sea, That to the Bay, the Bay to thee.

It may not be; too long the track To follow down or struggle back.

The sun has set on fair Naushon Long ere my western blaze is gone; The ocean disk is rolling dark In shadows round your swinging bark, While yet the yellow sunset fills The stream that scarfs my spruce-clad hills; The day-star wakes your island deer Long ere my barnyard chanticleer; Your mists are soaring in the blue While mine are sparks of glittering dew.

It may not be; oh, would it might, Could I live o'er that glowing night!

What golden hours would come to life, What goodly feats of peaceful strife,-- Such jests, that, drained of every joke, The very bank of language broke,-- Such deeds, that Laughter nearly died With st.i.tches in his belted side; While Time, caught fast in pleasure's chain, His double goblet snapped in twain, And stood with half in either hand,-- Both br.i.m.m.i.n.g full,--but not of sand!