Classic Poem

On the Palisades

And still we climbed
Upward into those sheer and threatening cliffs,
Storming against the sky.
As though to stop our impudent assault,
The sun laid great hot hands upon our backs,
And bent them down.
There were no bluff, good-humored winds to push us on;
There were no shrubs to grasp, no staff to aid—
Laughter was all we leaned on. . .

We dared not turn to view the dizzy depth—and then,
At last the height! … and the long climb over.
And, laughing still, we drew long, panting breaths;
And our pulses jumped with a proud and foolish thrill,
As though we had gained not merely the top of a hill,
But a victory.

Up here, the gaunt earth seemed to sprawl,
Stretching its legs beyond the cramping skies,
And lie upon its cloudy back, and yawn.
Rhythmical breezes arose,
Like a strong man waking from sleep;
Like the measured breathing of day.
And the earth stirred and called us. . .
An unseen path sprang from the undergrowth,
And dodged among the bushes lightly, beckoning us on.
Vine-snares and rocks made way for us;
Daisies threw themselves before our feet;
The eager little armies of the grass,
Waving their happy spears, ran on beside us;
And when we slackened, when we thought of resting,
The running grasses stopped, the earth sank back into itself,
Became a living pillow, a soft breast,
And every branch held out its comforting arms. . .
The winds pressed close, and, growing gentle, sang to us;
And so we sat beneath the mothering trees.

Languor leaned down
And, whispering peace, drew us into ourselves.
And in the drowsy sunlight
We mused, escaping from the clanging world;
Happy to sink in visions and soft fantasies
For solace—and for strength;
To dip into a dream, as into sleep,
And wring new ardor from it, and rise refreshed;
Irradiant, held by no soothing past,
Blundering brightly on.

Then, in an unseen flash,
The air was sharp with energy again;
The afternoon tingled and snapped, electric with laughter.
And he, our friend and lover, our buoyant, swaggering boy,—
His soul as fiery as his flaming hair,—
Began to sing this snatch of ancient rhyme
Caught from the pickers in the cotton-fields:

“Lord, He thought He'd make a man,
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)
Made him out er earth an' a han'ful er san'.
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)

“I know it; indeed, I know it, brudders;
I know it. Dese bones gwine ter rise again.

“Thought He'd make an 'umman too;
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)
Didn't know 'zackly what ter do.
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)

“Tuk one rib fum Adam's side,
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)
Made Miss Eve fer to be his bride.
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)”

Five hundred feet below us lay the world—
The Sunday-colored crowds busy at play,
The children, the tawdry lovers, and the far-off tremor of ships,
Came to us, caught us out of the blurring vastness,
As things remembered from dreams. . . .
And still he sang, while we joined in with childlike mirth
The deep, infectious music of a childlike race.

“Sot 'em in a gyarden rich an' fair;
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)
Tol' 'em dey could eat watever wuz dere.
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)

“Fum one tree you mus' not eat;
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)
Ef you do, you'll have ter skeet!
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)

“Sarpint woun' him roun' er trunk;
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)
At Miss Eve his eye he wunk.
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)

“I know it; indeed, I know it, brudders;
I know it—”

Like a blue snake uncoiled,
The lazy river, stretching between the banks,
Smoothed out its rippling folds, splotchy with sunlight,
And slept again, basking in silence.
A sea gull chattered stridently;
We heard, breaking the rhythms of the song,
The cough of the asthmatic motor-boat
Spluttering toward the pier. . . .
And stillness again.

“Lord, He come wid a 'ponstrous voice;
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)
Shook dis whole earth to its joists,
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)

“‘Adam, Adam, war' art thou?’
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)
‘Yas, good Lord, I's a-comin' now’
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)

“‘Stole my apples, I believe—’
(Dese bone gwine ter rise again.)
‘No, Marse Lord, I 'speck 'twas Eve’
(Dese bones gwine ter rise again.)”

The little boat drew nearer toward the land,
Still puffing like a wheezy runner out of breath.
And we could see, crowding its narrow decks,
The little human midges—remote and so unhuman;
Seeming to belong less to life than the fearless ants
That swarmed upon the remnants of our lunch,
Heedless of all the gods on whom they casually dared to climb.
So far the people seemed! …
And still a faint stirring reached us;
A thin thread of music flung its airy filaments toward heaven,
Where we, the happy deities, sat enthroned.
Straining our ears we caught the slender tone,
“Darling, I am growing old; silver threads among—”
And then it broke. . .

And over us rushed the warm flood of the human need.
Out of that frayed, cheap song something thrust out
And gripped us like a warm and powerful hand.
No longer olympian, aloof upon our solemn eminence,
We crumbled on our heights and yearned to them.
The very distance had a chill for us.—
What if, of a sudden, the boat should topple and plunge;
‘And there should rise a confused crying of people, and the faint high voice of a child;
And heads should bob in the water, and sink like rotten corks—
And we, up here so helpless,
Unhuman and remote. . .

A twilight mist stole up the bay;
In a nearby clump a young screech-owl wailed;
A breeze blew strangely cold, and, with a covert haste,
We gathered up our things, whistled a breath too loud,
And took the path down to the earth we knew—
The earth we knew, the dear and casual world
Of sleep that followed struggle, struggle that called from sleep—
The harsh, beloved, immortal invitation.

And, as we walked, the song sprang up again;
And, as we sang, the words took on new power and majesty;
The dying sun became a part of them,
Gathering his fires in one last singing beam,
In one bright, lyric death.
The skies caught up the chorus, thundering it back
From every cranny of the windy heavens;
And, rising from the rocks and silent waters,
Hailing the happy energy as its own,
The flood of life laughed with that gay conviction:
I know it. Indeed I know it, brothers;
I know it! These bones will rise again. . .
Lulled by no soft and easy dreams,
Out of the crowded agonies of birth on birth,
Refreshed and radiant,
These bones will rise.
Out of the very arms of cradling Death,
English