Classic Poem

Yes , he was well-nigh gone and near his rest,
The year could not renew him; nor the cry
Of building nightingales about the nest;
Nor that soft freshness of the May-wind's sigh

That fell before the garden scents, and died
Between the ampler leafage of the trees:
All these he knew not, lying open-eyed,
Deep in a dream that was not pain nor ease,

But death not yet. Outside a woman talked —
His wife she was — whose clicking needles sped
To faded phrases of complaint that balked
My rising words of comfort. Overhead,

A cage that hung amid the jasmine stars
Trembled a little, and a blossom dropped.
Then notes came pouring through the wicker bars,
Climbed half a rapid arc of song, and stopped.

" Is it a thrush?" I asked. " A thrush," she said.
" That was Will's tune. Will taught him that before
He left the doorway settle for his bed,
Sick as you see, and couldn't teach him more.

" He'd bring his Bible here o'nights, would Will,
Following the light, and whiles when it was dark
And days were warm, he'd sit there whistling still,
Teaching the bird. He whistled like a lark."

" Jack! Jack!" A joyous flutter stirred the cage,
Shaking the blossoms down. The bird began;
The woman turned again to want and wage,
And in the inner chamber sighed the man.

How clear the song was! Musing as I heard,
My fancies wandered from the droning wife
To sad comparison of man and bird, —
The broken song, the uncompleted life,

That seemed a broken song; and of the two,
My thought a moment deemed the bird more blest,
That, when the sun shone, sang the notes it knew,
Without desire or knowledge of the rest.

Nay, happier man. For him futurity
Still hides a hope that this his earthly praise
Finds heavenly end, for surely will not He,
Solver of all, above his Flower of Days,

Teach him the song that no one living knows?
Let the man die, with that half-chant of his, —
What Now discovers not Hereafter shows,
And God will surely teach him more than this.

Again the Bird. I turned, and passed along;
But Time and Death, Eternity and Change,
Talked with me ever, and the climbing song
Rose in my hearing, beautiful and strange.