The darkness brings no quiet here, the light
No waking: ever on my blinded brain
The flare of lights, the rush, and cry, and strain,
The engines' scream, the hiss and thunder smite:
I see the hurrying crowds, the clasp, the flight,
Faces that touch, eyes that are dim with pain:
I see the hoarse wheels turn, and the great train
Move labouring out into the bourneless night.
So many souls within its dim recesses,
So many bright, so many mournful eyes:
Mine eyes that watch grow fixed with dreams and guesses;

Beautiful Railway Bridge of the Silvery Tay!
With your numerous arches and pillars in so grand array
And your central girders, which seem to the eye
To be almost towering to the sky.
The greatest wonder of the day,
And a great beautification to the River Tay,
Most beautiful to be seen,
Near by Dundee and the Magdalen Green.

Beautiful Railway Bridge of the Silvery Tay!
That has caused the Emperor of Brazil to leave
His home far away, incognito in his dress,
And view thee ere he passed along en route to Inverness.

The whole world on a raft! A King is here,
The record of his grandeur but a smear.
Is it his deacon-beard, or old bald pate
That makes the band upon his whims to wait?
Loot and mud-honey have his soul defiled.
Quack, pig, and priest, he drives camp-meetings wild
Until they shower their pennies like spring rain
That he may preach upon the Spanish main.
What landlord, lawyer, voodoo-man has yet
A better native right to make men sweat?

The whole world on a raft! A Duke is here
At sight of whose lank jaw the muses leer.

Fly, son of Banquo! Fleance, fly!
Leave thy guilty sire to die.
O'er the heath the stripling fled,
The wild storm howling round his head.
Fear mightier thro' the shades of night
Urged his feet, and wing'd his flight;
And still he heard his father cry
Fly, son of Banquo! Fleance, fly.

Fly, son of Banquo! Fleance, fly
Leave thy guilty sire to die.
On every blast was heard the moan
The anguish'd shriek, the death-fraught groan;
Loathly night-hags join the yell
And see--the midnight rites of Hell.

Forms of magic! spare my life!

A part, immutable, unseen,
Being, before itself had been,
Became. Like dew a triple queen
Shone as the void uncovered:
The silence of deep height was drawn
A veil across the silver dawn
On holy wings that hovered.

The music of three thoughts became
The beauty, that is one white flame,
The justice that surpasses shame,
The victory, the splendour,
The sacred fountain that is whirled
From depths beyond that older world
A new world to engender.

The kingdom is extended. Night
Dwells, and I contemplate the sight

[Written for a picture]


The Youth speaks: —:
"Why do you seek the sun
In your bubble-crown ascending?
Your chariot will melt to mist.
Your crown will have an ending."

The Goddess replies: — :
"Nay, sun is but a bubble,
Earth is a whiff of foam —
To my caves on the coast of Thule
Each night I call them home.
Thence Faiths blow forth to angels
And loves blow forth to men —
They break and turn to nothing
And I make them whole again.
On the crested waves of chaos
I ride them back reborn:

Our sardine fishermen work at night in the dark
of the moon; daylight or moonlight
They could not tell where to spread the net,
unable to see the phosphorescence of the
shoals of fish.
They work northward from Monterey, coasting
Santa Cruz; off New Year's Point or off
Pigeon Point
The look-out man will see some lakes of milk-color
light on the sea's night-purple; he points,
and the helmsman
Turns the dark prow, the motorboat circles the

They shall see Him in the crimson flush
Of morning's early light,
In the drapery of sunset,
Around the couch of night.

When the clouds drop down their fatness,
In late and early rain,
They shall see His glorious footprints
On valley, hill and plain.

They shall see Him when the cyclone
Breathes terror through the land;
They shall see Him 'mid the murmurs
Of zephyrs soft and bland.

They shall see Him when the lips of health,
Breath vigor through each nerve,
When pestilence clasps hands with death,

I have fetched the tears up out of the little wells,
Scooped them up with small, iron words,
Dripping over the runnels.

The harsh, cold wind of my words drove on, and still
I watched the tears on the guilty cheek of the boys
Glitter and spill.

Cringing Pity, and Love, white-handed, came
Hovering about the Judgment which stood in my eyes,
Whirling a flame.

. . . . . . .

The tears are dry, and the cheeks’ young fruits are fresh
With laughter, and clear the exonerated eyes, since pain

[In memory of E. S. Frazee, Rush County, Indiana]


Into the acres of the newborn state
He poured his strength, and plowed his ancient name,
And, when the traders followed him, he stood
Towering above their furtive souls and tame.

That brow without a stain, that fearless eye
Oft left the passing stranger wondering
To find such knighthood in the sprawling land,
To see a democrat well-nigh a king.

He lived with liberal hand, with guests from far,
With talk and joke and fellowship to spare, —