Classic Poem

PART III.

The great farmhouse of Malcolm Graem stood,
Square-shouldered and peak-roofed, upon a hill,
With many windows looking everywhere,
So that no distant meadow might lie hid,
Nor corn-field hide its gold, nor lowing herd
Browse in far pastures, out of Malcolm's ken.
He loved to sit, grim, grey, and somewhat stern,
And thro' the smoke-clouds from his short clay pipe
Look out upon his riches, while his thoughts
Swung back and forth between the bleak, stern past
And the near future; for his life had come
To that close balance when, a pendulum,
The memory swings between the " then " and " now. "
His seldom speech ran thus two different ways:
" When I was but a laddie, thus I did " ;
Or, " Katie, in the fall I'll see to build
Such fences or such sheds about the place;
And next year, please the Lord, another barn. "
Katie's gay garden foamed about the walls,
Assailed the prim-cut modern sills, and rushed
Up the stone walls to break on the peaked roof.
And Katie's lawn was like a poet's sward,
Velvet and sheer and diamonded with dew;
For such as win their wealth most aptly take
Smooth urban ways and blend them with their own.
And Katie's dainty raiment was as fine
As the smooth, silken petals of the rose,
And her light feet, her nimble mind and voice,
In city schools had learned the city's ways,
And, grafts upon the healthy, lovely vine,
They shone, eternal blossoms 'mid the fruit;
For Katie had her sceptre in her hand
And wielded it right queenly there and here,
In dairy, store-room, kitchen — every spot
Where woman's ways were needed on the place.

And Malcolm took her through his mighty fields
And taught her lore about the change of crops,
And how to see a handsome furrow ploughed,
And how to choose the cattle for the mart,
And how to know a fair day's work when done,
And where to plant young orchards; for he said,
" God sent a lassie, but I need a son —
" Bethankit for His mercies all the same. "
And Katie, when he said it, thought of Max,
Who had been gone two winters and two springs,
And sighed and thought, " Would he not be your son? "
But all in silence, for she had too much
Of the firm will of Malcolm in her soul
To think of shaking that deep-rooted rock;
But hoped the crystal current of his love
For his one child, increasing day by day,
Might fret with silver lip until it wore
Such channels thro' the rock that some slight stroke
Of circumstance might crumble down the stone.

The wooer too, Max prophesied, had come;
Reputed wealthy; with the azure eyes
And Saxon-gilded locks, the fair, clear face
And stalwart form that most of women love;
And with the jewels of some virtues set
On his broad brow; with fires within his soul
He had the wizard skill to fetter down
To that mere pink, poetic, nameless glow
That need not fright a flake of snow away,
But, if unloosed, could melt an adverse rock,
Marrowed with iron, frowning in his way.

And Malcolm balanced him by day and night,
And with his grey-eyed shrewdness partly saw
He was not one for Kate, but let him come
And in chance moments thought, " Well, let it be;
They make a bonnie pair; he knows the ways
Of men and things; can hold the gear I give,
And, if the lassie wills it, let it be; "
And then, upstarting from his midnight sleep,
With hair erect and sweat upon his brow
Such as no labour e'er had beaded there,
Would cry aloud, wide staring thro' the dark,
" Nay, nay! She shall not wed him! Rest in peace! "
Then, fully waking, grimly laugh and say,
" Why did I speak and answer when none spake? "
But still lie staring, wakeful, through the shades,
List'ning to the silence, and beating still
The ball of Alfred's merits to and fro,
Saying, between the silent arguments,
" But would the mother like it, could she know?
I would there were a way to ring a lad
Like silver coin, and so find out the true.
But Kate shall say him " Nay" or say him " Yea"
At her own will. "

And Katie said him " Nay "
In all the maiden, speechless, gentle ways
A woman has. But Alfred only laughed
To his own soul, and said in his walled mind,
" O Kate, were I a lover I might feel
Despair flap o'er my hopes with raven wings,
Because thy love is given to other love.
And did I love, unless I gained thy love
I would disdain the golden hair, sweet lips,
True violet eyes and gentle air-blown form,
Nor crave the beauteous lamp without the flame,
Which in itself would light a charnel house.
Unloved and loving, I would find the cure
Of Love's despair in nursing Love's disdain —
Disdain of lesser treasure than the whole.
One cares not much to place against the wheel
A diamond lacking flame, nor loves to pluck
A rose with all its perfume cast abroad
To the bosom of the gale. Not I, in truth!
If all man's days are three-score years and ten,
He needs must waste them not, but nimbly seize
The bright, consummate blossom that his will
Calls for most loudly. Gone, long gone the days
When Love within my soul forever stretched
Fierce hands of flame, and here and there I found
A blossom fitted for him, all up-filled
With love as with clear dew: — they had their hour
And burned to ashes with him as he drooped
In his own ruby fires. No phaenix he
To rise again, because of Katie's eyes,
On dewy wings from ashes such as his!
But now another passion bids me forth
To crown him with the fairest I can find,
And makes me lover, not of Katie's face,
But of her father's riches. O high fool,
Who feels the faintest pulsing of a wish
And fails to feed it into lordly life,
So that, when stumbling back to Mother Earth,
His freezing lip may curl in cold disdam
Of those poor, blighted fools who starward stare
For that fruition, nipped and scanted here!
And while the clay o'ermasters all his blood,
And he can feel the dust knit with his flesh,
He yet can say to them, " Be ye content;
I tasted perfect fruitage thro' my life,
Lighted all lamps of passion till the oil
Failed from their wicks; and now, O now I know
There is no Immortality could give
Such boon as this — to simply cease to be!
There lies your Heaven, O ye dreaming slaves,
If ye would only live to make it so,
Nor paint upon the blue skies lying shades
Of — what is not . Wise, wise and strong the man
Who poisons that fond haunter of the mind,
Craving for a hereafter with deep draughts
Of wild delights so fiery, fierce, and strong,
That when their dregs are deeply, deeply drained,
What once was blindly craved of purblind Chance —
Life, life eternal, throbbing thro' all space —
Is strongly loathed; and, with his face in dust,
Man loves his only heaven — six feet of earth.
So, Katie, tho' your blue eyes say me " Nay,"
My pangs of love for gold must needs be fed,
And shall be, Katie, if I know my mind. "

Events were winds close nestling in the sails
Of Alfred's bark, all blowing him direct
To his wished harbour. On a certain day
All set about with roses and with fire —
One of three days of heat which frequent slip,
Like triple rubies, in between the sweet,
Mild, emerald days of summer — Katie went,
Drawn by a yearning for the ice-pale blooms,
Natant and shining, firing all the bay
With angel fires built up of snow and gold.
She found the bay close packed with groaning logs
Prisoned between great arms of close-hinged wood,
All cut from Malcolm's forests in the west
And floated thither to his noisy mills,
And all stamped with the potent " M " and " G "
Which much he loved to see upon his goods —
The silent courtiers owning him their king.
Out clear beyond, the rustling rice-beds sang,
And the cool lilies starred the shadowed wave.
" This is a day for lily-love, " said Kate,
While she made bare the lilies of her feet
And sang a lily-song that Max had made
That spoke of lilies — always meaning Kate:

" While, Lady of the silvered lakes —
Chaste goddess of the sweet, still shrine
The jocund river fitful makes
By sudden, deep gloomed brakes —
Close sheltered by close warp and woof of vine,
Spilling a shadow gloomy-rich as wine
Into the silver throne where thou dost sit,
Thy silken leaves all dusky round thee knit!

" Mild Soul of the unsalted wave,
White bosom holding golden fire,
Deep as some ocean-hidden cave
Are fixed the roots of thy desire,
Thro' limpid currents stealing up,
And rounding to the pearly cup.
Thou dost desire,
With all thy trembling heart of sinless fire,
But to be filled
With dew distilled
From clear, fond skies that in their gloom
Hold, floating high, thy sister moon.
Pale chalice of a sweet perfume,
Whiter-breasted than a dove,
To thee the dew is — love! "

Kate bared her little feet and poised herself
On the first log close grating on the shore;
And with bright eyes of laughter and wild hair —
A flying wind of gold — from log to log
Sped, laughing as they wallowed in her track
Like brown-scaled monsters, rolling as her foot
Spurned deftly each in turn with rose-white sole.
A little island, out in middle wave,
With its green shoulder held the great drive braced
Between it and the mainland, — here it was
The silver lilies drew her with white smiles —
And as she touched the last great log of all
It reeled, upstarting, like a column braced
A second on the wave, and when it plunged
Rolling upon the froth and sudden foam,
Katie had vanished, and with angry grind
The vast logs rolled together; nor a lock
Of drifting, yellow hair, an upflung hand,
Told where the rich man's chiefest treasure sank
Under his wooden wealth.

But Alfred, prone
With pipe and book upon the shady marge
Of the cool isle, saw all, and seeing hurled
Himself, and hardly knew it, on the logs.
By happy chance a shallow lapped the isle
On this green bank; and when his iron arms
Dashed the barked monsters, as frail stems of rice,
A little space apart, the soft, slow tide
But reached his chest, and in a flash he saw
Kate's yellow hair, and by it drew her up,
And lifting her aloft, cried out, " O Kate! "
And once again cried, " Katie! is she dead? "
For like the lilies broken by the rough
And sudden riot of the armoured logs,
Kate lay upon his hands; and now the logs
Closed in upon him, nipping his great chest,
Nor could he move to push them off again
For Katie in his arms. " And now, " he said,
" If none should come, and any wind arise
To weld these woody monsters 'gainst the isle,
I shall be cracked like any broken twig;
And as it is, I know not if I die,
For I am hurt — ay, sorely, sorely hurt! "
Then looked on Katie's lily face, and said,
" Dead, dead or living? Why, an even chance.
O lovely bubble on a troubled sea,
I would not thou shouldst lose thyself again
In the black ocean whence thy life emerged,
But skyward steal on gales as soft as love,
And hang in some bright rainbow overhead,
If only such bright rainbow spanned the earth. "
Then shouted loudly, till the silent air
Roused like a frightened bird, and on its wings
Caught up his cry and bore it to the farm.
There Malcolm, leaping from his noontide sleep,
Upstarted as at midnight, crying out,
" She shall not wed him! Rest you, wife, in peace! "

They found him, Alfred, haggard-eyed and faint,
But holding Katie ever toward the sun,
Unhurt, and waking in the fervent heat.
And now it came that Alfred, being sick
Of his sharp hurts and tended by them both
With what was like to love — being born of thanks —
Had choice of hours most politic to woo,
And used his deed, as one might use the sun
To ripe unmellowed fruit; and from the core
Of Katie's gratitude hoped yet to nurse
A flower all to his liking — Katie's love.

But Katie's mind was like the plain, broad shield
Of a table diamond, nor had a score of sides;
And in its shield, so precious and so plain,
Was cut thro' all its clear depths Max's name.
And so she said him " Nay " at last, in words
Of such true-sounding silver that he knew
He might not win her at the present hour,
But smiled and thought, " I go, and come again;
Then shall we see. Our three-score years and ten
Are mines of treasure, if we hew them deep,
Nor stop too long in choosing out our tools. "