*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 64548 ***

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

RHYMES OF OUR VALLEY CHRISTOPHER CRICKET ON CATS THE LIMERATOMY WINGS AND OTHER WAR RHYMES

The tinder-brush has caught the spark, the temples of the night, Their purple columns towering high, glow in the amber light. (“By Scarlet Torch and Blade.”)

BY SCARLET TORCH
AND BLADE

BY
ANTHONY EUWER

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY THE AUTHOR

“A four-league stretch is burning now— The cavalcade of death Moves on with scarlet torch and blade And with a scarlet breath.”

G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
The Knickerbocker Press

Second printing, January, 1926

Made in the United States of America

To the Memory of
MY SISTER
MARIAN

WHOSE NEVER FAILING ENCOURAGEMENT
WENT FAR TOWARD THE MAKING OF
THIS BOOK.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

To all the joy that colors give beneath the sun and moon; to all pleasurable sounds and wholesome odors of the earth and air and sea; to the warmth and glow of genial firesides and to the bite of winter winds; to the rain upon the lichens; to the majesty of mountains and the awfulness of high places; to the darkness of caves and the friendliness of far-off trails; to every furry thing—the shy, the dumb, and whatsoever creature has found expression in his fancy; to both the nobler and the meaner natures of men; to life’s laughter and life’s tears and to all fruitful experience; to these sources, for whatsoever [Pg viii] good may here be found, the author makes acknowledgment.

A number of the rhymes in the present volume have previously appeared in the Associated Press, Judge, Leslie’s, the Oregon Sunday Journal, and The Open Road. For permission to reprint the drawings the author is indebted to the publishers of Scribner’s Magazine.

[Pg ix]

PART ONE
THE OPEN SPACES
	PAGE
By Scarlet Torch and Blade	3
Builders of Highways	10
Oregon Snow	18
The Pruner	23
Snoots	27
Little Black Bull	30
Mountain Tops	32
The River	33
The Juggler	34
Nature’s Totems	36
Minstrels of the Night	38
The Long Bet	39
The Caves of Josephine	43
Hobnobbing with the Firmament	50
PART TWO
PEOPLE AND THINGS [Pg x]
Hearth-glow	61
The Want-ad of My Soul	63
The Bell	65
Gossip	68
Love’s Labor Lost	73
The Half Undone	75
The Man Who Poisons Dogs	77
A and The	79
Melted Candles	80
Holly	83
PART THREE
MORE RHYME THAN REASON
Monday	87
Gettin’ to It	90
Flies	93
A Dino’s Aura	100
Just Cat	109
Danger	112
PART FOUR
A PAGEANT OF THE TREES
The Forest	115
The Sequoia Gigantia	118
A Spruce’s Root	120
The Douglas Fir	123
The Tamarack	125
The Monterey Cypress	127 [Pg xi]
The Madrona	129
The Yellow Pine	130
The Brush	132
The Timber-line	135
The Ghost-Trees	138
PART FIVE
RHYMES OF FRANCE
Frogs	143
Transition	145
Kiddy of France	149
Spring—1919	150
Homesick	152

[Pg xii]

[Pg xiii]

ILLUSTRATIONS

	FACING
	PAGE
Temples of the Night	Frontispiece
By Scarlet Torch and Blade	4
Oregon Snow	18
The Long Bet	40
Hobnobbing with the Firmament	50
The Want-ad of My Soul	64
The Sequoia Gigantia	118
The Douglas Fir	124
The Yellow Pine	130
The Ghost-Trees	138

[Pg 1]

[Pg 2]

THE OPEN SPACES

[Pg 3]

BY SCARLET TORCH AND BLADE

All the land is lying listless and a warm September breeze Has brushed the green to silver on the rustling orchard trees, And the near-by hills are curtained with a doleful, yellow cloak, For the world is swathed and sweltering and blanketed in smoke. Up the Sacramento Valley from the ’Frisco country south, To Seattle and Vancouver there’s a thirsty, baking drouth; From the Rockies to the Coast Range ’neath the heavy-hanging haze Leagues and leagues of trees are giving up their ghosts in smoke and blaze; There are endless acres smouldering, their trunks forever dead— Oh, is it any wonder that the sun’s a red-hot red! [Pg 4]

From the towns they’re rushing fighters—rushing, rushing them by rail. They’re meeting them in motors and they’ll tote ’em up the trail Where the pack-nags are a-packing with a tramp, tramp, tramp— Packing tools and grub and blankets up the canyon to the camp. And fire they’ll foil with back-fire—pitting pitch ’gainst snarling pitch, They’ll slash the brake and lacerate the earth with upturned ditch; Their skins will smart with singeing draughts that play along their tracks, They’ll sting with wet from reeking sweat of shovel, pick and ax.

She’s headed up for Clear Creek and she’ll make it ’fore she stops, For she’s a roaring crown-fire with her windswept, blazing tops. From flaming lance to flaming lance on through the parching day, Exhaling clouds of rolling black, she surges on her way. She sucks the flying embers like a burning hurricane, She flings them miles around her in a sputtering, sparking rain, [Pg 5] She pants and thirsts for living green, she stays not for the snags, She’s changed the steep embankments and she’s gained the higher crags; Her Devil’s dance leads ever up—exultingly she swings Her wild red arms out toward the heights—she sizzles and she sings; With dragon-spit she hisses, a maniac in her wrath, She laughs to scorn the human things that try to block her path. On yonder crest they’ve made their stand—hark to the timber fall, Again the winds have veered around—the bosses curse and call Through driving blasts of pitch-pine heat and pitch-pine smoke and smell, “She’s turned again—hang to your tools—and damn you—run like Hell!” It takes a canny general whose eye’s a weather-vane, A mighty canny general with seamed and schemy brain, To meet the gay manœuvers and the unconventional ways That a breeze kicks up at noonday in a crown-fire forest blaze. [Pg 6]

Her Devil’s dance leads ever up— Exultingly she swings Her wild red arms out toward the heights— She sizzles and she sings.

But when the cooling later hours have lulled her hot desire, She straggles down the blackened trunks in fretful gusts of fire. The tinder-brush has caught the spark, the temples of the night, Their purple columns towering high, glow in the amber light. There’s a maple dancing, dancing with her arabesques of gold, Till her flaming scarfs have shrivelled, fluttered down and touched the mould. From censers gleaming fitfully the dripping pitch-gum falls, And heavy incense fills those wild and weirdly lighted halls. Each hollow stump a cauldron is with molten pitch aglow— Its roots are twisted holes of pitch that pierce the earth below. Beyond the burning border of the bracken and the vine, A ruddy edge is eating through the carpet of the pine, But the fighters, they will meet it with their paths of upturned soil— It’s many days those little paths have saved in sweat and toil. [Pg 7] A four-league stretch is burning now—the cavalcade of death Moves on with scarlet torch and blade and with a scarlet breath, And over all the smoking ridge, the clouds that hang like lead— Oh, is it any wonder that the moon’s a red-hot red!

And when the golden ladders of tomorrow’s sickly sun Slant through the mournful tree-tops and the holocaust is done, There won’t be much to interest the breathing things around In the charred and ashen litter of the scarred and ghastly ground. There’s quite a large community that undertook to change Its residential section to a more inviting range. There is a fox—a red, red fox, who took his bouncing luck And dusted down the pathway of a panic-stricken buck; There’s a corps of gray-backed diggers and a bunch of cottontails Who didn’t tarry very long to figure out their trails; [Pg 8] And the suckers and the peckers and the flickers and the wrens, And the buzzards and the finches and the cocks and pheasant-hens, And the jays and bees and skeeters and the gnats and dragon-flies Have saved their skins and feathers for they’re fairly weather-wise. But woe betide the crawling things and heaven help the mark For every wriggly worm that rides the earth or bores the bark; And every caterpillar—and a caterpillar’s hairs Can get as badly frizzled as a big, brown furry bear’s; And woe betide the silly squirrels who for a refuge run Far up the blazing trees because it’s what they’ve always done. And may the blessed Jesus save all souls of mortal men Who perish in that fiery maze, walled in their smothering pen, Like those they found near Jefferson upon the mountain side, Who strangled there near Jefferson—with fingers clenched they died. [Pg 9]

Oh would you know the meaning of that lazy yellow haze, Why the sun’s a scarlet pinwheel in the late September days, Why the thirsty earth’s a-drowsing ’neath a lowering panoply From ’Frisco to Seattle—from the Rockies to the sea? For the skirmish that they’re having up the Clear Creek canyon there Is but one of all the flare-ups that are burning everywhere. And you’ll know them—oh, you’ll know them when a decade’s come and gone, And the lifeless bark has fallen from those trunks now pale and wan, And their ghostly, gray battalions in their long unbroken lines, Stalk the ridges, rising, falling—ghosts that once were firs and pines; You will know them—you will know them when a score of years has run, Faintly limned in mist, or gleaming—silver lances in the sun.

[Pg 10]

BUILDERS OF HIGHWAYS

Masterful builders! You who’ve planned Your limitless highways through our land, Splendid in vision—well have you wrought, Leaving your trails where trails were not; Weavers—weaving gigantically Into a boundless tapestry, Systems of travel skillfully traced, Hither and thither—interlaced, Gathering, linking, chain on chain, Corn-land and pasture, fields of grain, Acres of orchard rolling down, Forest and homestead, nestling town, Binding our counties, joining our states, Breaking the locks of our cities’ gates, Letting humanity’s stream rush through Into the open, into the blue, Into the sun or into the shade, Into the playgrounds you have made, Treading where never before they’ve trod— Touching the earth and seeing God!

Long have you wrestled, unconfounded With problems the grim old earth propounded; [Pg 11] Meeting each taunting challenge while She watched with cold, sardonic smile, Flinching at nothing your labor met, Writing your answer in dirt and sweat.

First with your transit, pounding stakes— Rotten logs, briars, sticks and snakes; Trees of the thicket hatchet-scarred, Blazing tomorrow’s boulevard; Shaping the New World’s big romance, Unloosing your swarms of human ants, Slashing the willows, crowding in Under the maples and chinkapin; Tottering timbers—see them crash, Deafening thud and crunch and gash, Tearing their rifts where boughs arch high, Baring blue holes in the gaping sky; Follows the blasting—dynamite, Deep in the damp earth tamped in tight, Sputtering spark Into the dark, Travels the fuse to the buried guns, Vomiting stumps in hurtling tons, Falling back mangled, shattered, torn, Into the clay where they were born.

Through pine-pillared aisles the thunderings ring, Echoing canyons answering; [Pg 12] Enter the horses—lashing reins, Yelling and curses, jangling chains, Snorting and straining, steaming brutes, Grappling hooks shackled to stubborn roots, Snug in their sockets holding fast— Steadily pulling, they yield at last! Shovel of steam—omniverous scoop, Gouging the way for one more loop; Rearing a wall that will prevail Against the push of sliding shale; Peeling a slope to fill a draw; Stuffing the crusher’s hungry maw That crumbles to bits the rock you’ve fed To blanket a roadway’s winding bed; These are the digits running through The problems that Nature’s handed you.

And we of the people—we for whom These miracles are, behold we come! Driving our chariots blazoned bright, Crimson and yellow and pink and white, Silver and black and gray and green, Rattletrap Lizzie and limousine, Bulgy with bedding, grip and can, Lashed to the back and tucked to the van; Letting our home-town banners flame, Advising the world from whence we came, [Pg 13] From everywhere under the dusty sun— From Mosier, White Salmon, Pendleton, From Boise, Seattle, Saginaw, From Buffalo, Little Rock, Waukesha; Still we are coming, see the train— From “all points east” to Bangor, Maine; Up from the Dixies, looming still, From Charleston, Havana, Jacksonville; Down from the Old Dominion, see— From Montreal, Winnipeg, Calgary, We of the people are on our way, Turning the world to a holiday!

And vast are the hollows from crest to crest Where stretches the hand of the big Northwest And out of the winds from her frozen peak A welcome speaks: “Come all you people! Come and keep Tryst in our mountains! Play and sleep, Wrapped in the silence here that lies Under our star-jeweled western skies; Wake if you will and see the sun Unveiling our canyons one by one, Slanting his golden fingers till The shadows have crept from each drowsy hill, Rousing the giants in their beds— See how they lift their hoary heads [Pg 14] Up through the purple robe of night Into the light! Tahoma—the Mountain that was God! Jefferson, Adams, St. Helens, Hood! Hold fast to your visions and your dreams, Memories born of our laughing streams, Our cataracts, castles, towering domes— Oh carry them back to your million homes! Drink, oh you people! Be satisfied! Our wells of beauty are never dried. Search out each Eden that awaits— Blazed are the trails and wide the gates!”

Come oh you people! Look upon The bountiful sweep of the Oregon, Forcing a pass through the blue Cascades, Lapping the walls of her palisades, Cradled in sand-dunes gleaming white, Girdling her islands of malachite! And high on the hills where a thrush’s song Tells out its gladness, there winds along Like a sinuous serpent—twist and bend, Following on to the river’s trend, The lordliest highway that ever ran Through the hills of the world since the dawn of man. Pride of the West! Sublime event! Columbia the Magnificent! [Pg 15] Conceived by a poet who believed [1] Dreams should be dreamed and then achieved.

And he bored him a tunnel—rock and boulder, Out of a mountain’s granite shoulder, Chiseled his windows—arching wide, Glimpsing the sky and the rolling tide; Throwing his graceful spans across Dripping ravines of fern and moss; Charming the serpent up and down Till it lazily coiled on the lofty crown, Goal of each traveller who would be Thrilled with unspeakable ecstacy.

Oh climb in your chariots pink and green, Rattletrap Lizzie and limousine, Throbbing triumphantly toward the sky, (There’s never a grade but you take on high) Honking and honking, round on round, Honking again till the cliffs resound, Looping at last the Crown Point top— And there you stop! Where winds from the North, East, West and South Tumble their clouds in the chasm’s mouth— Curtains of mist and far-off thunder— And somehow you look and look and wonder [Pg 16] If he who was wise to the sparrow’s fall Didn’t have something to do with it all.

Over the broad Willamette go Into the Coast Range—learn to know Who are the Vikings—see them rise Out of the gulches into the skies; There are plummet-lines dropped through the hearts of these And they’re girthed like the pillars of Hercules! Nursed by the centuries, still they stand, The Viking Spruce of the bottom-land.

And ever the pageant swings along, Blossoms and fruit and birds and song— Sword-ferns high-heaped beneath the firs, Glistening like emerald scimiters; Foxglove and fireweed—sunlight flashes Blotching the banks in purple splashes; Salmon berries in hordes untold— Luscious clusters of dangling gold; Elders above them, bending branches. Falling in ruby-red avalanches, Hedging the roadways, climbing back— Up through the alders and tamarack; And over the bridges, rumbling, coasting— Oh God of the Humble—keep us from boasting! [Pg 17] Ranges, ruff-backed with their jagged trees, Crawling and sprawling down into the seas, Reaching their ragged, granite hands Out through the shifting, drifting sands— Out where the wild, white horses prance, Tossing their manes—and the cormorants Strut with the lions and blustering seals, And the sun-god reels With a splash of blood Into the great, Pacific flood!

And this is the welcome waiting you, Drivers of chariots gold and blue— You who fare Under the heavens from everywhere— This is the crowning of your quest When you’ve looked in the heart of the great Northwest!

[1] Reference to Samuel Lancaster, Portland, Oregon.

[Pg 18]

OREGON SNOW

I’ m glad I’m not in town today For townfolk always have a way Of hating snow—they stamp it off Their feet and shake their clothes and cough And fume and curse it every time It comes. It seems a crime To say you love it when it snows— Down in the town. Yet I suppose They’re not to blame—it always brings A peck of ills and heartache things Down in the town. There’s such A lot of misery—so much That sleeps along until the touch Of snow and cold wakes it again To sudden pain. You really can’t blame folks a bit For hating snow and cursing it The way they do Down in the town—it’s natural to.

In great cascades of blinding white Shot through with light Of morning suns.

[Pg 19] But here—up here, it’s driving white Across the gray tree-trunks; all night It fell and laid one blanket more Upon the store We had. And I am glad, For here—up here, it’s not a crime To love the snow in winter-time.

It’s hip-deep in the clover-field Behind the barn—the woods there shield The sun. I took a jog On show-shoes with the dog Across the ditch that marks the clover’s edge Into a straggling hedge Of saplings—only yesterday they were So cocky and so straight—each baby-fir A prickly little grenadier; and now— How vanquished! Every bough Limp, beaten, crushed, as if The snow had said—“Oh stiff And upright little tree How much of me Do you suppose your arms will hold?” To which the tree made answer bold— “I am a young and husky fir— All you can give, I’ll hold, Good Sir!” A rather glib and short Retort, [Pg 20] At which the snow was somewhat stirred, He took the sapling at his word! For so it looked, the way the snow Had laid them low, Swamped to their ears, Those prickly little grenadiers.

That’s what it is to be so small And near the ground, but when you’re grand and tall You shake your boughs and let it fall In great cascades of blinding white, Shot through with light Or morning suns—spray after spray. The gray boles sway With every windy gust that breaks To dust and flakes The tumbling clumps, Baptizing brush and stumps And huge-heaped logs—a deluge, white And dazzling bright.

And still it snows, And blows Across the orchards in big drifts; But for the sunbursts through the rifts Of cloud today, It’s never quit. And when it goes away— [Pg 21] This snow up here, it will be free from blame For it will leave in beauty as it came. The sun will loosen all the bonds That bind the baby-sapling’s fronds Close to the ground, And they’ll rebound. The ice-locked creek will show its green And swirling eddies in between The marble bridges flung across Its twisted banks of moss.

Each day will see new colors peep; Gray bark and green—the deep Rich sheen of laurels—short, stalky grapes, Stiff, jagged, red—and twisted shapes Of leaves turned russet, shrivelled, sere— Still dangling from the stems of the dead year— All penciled bold against the bright, Cold snow, like patterns on a page of spotless white. And each new day will leave some strange, Blue arabesque upon the eastern range, Drag streaks of ochre down the fields, and shade The purple brush-lands deeper where they fade Off to the west, and pools of melting snow will hold The winter evening sun’s last splash of gold. [Pg 22]

These are the things God keeps in store For us up here, when in a few days more, This snow—that’s driving hard today, Will melt away.

[Pg 23]

THE PRUNER

Listen! That bump against the steps—he’s back. The dog comes floundering on his track, His shaggy clumps are lumped with ice, he shakes Vociferously his drippy coat and makes Straight for the kitchen—he’s a dog, the kind Who takes no longer than he should to find What’s in his pan—or isn’t. It’s cold mush This time. The man has just kicked off the slush And shuffled up the steps. They’re awkward things— Those bear-paws, when the rawhide’s caked; he flings His soggy mittens off and takes his hat And swishes it across the frozen mat.

He clatters on the porch—then stoops to loose The knots that hold his boots fast in the noose, Kicks free his weary feet and stands his hook Against the logs. He has an all-in look [Pg 24] Tonight—that crook that’s got his shoulder-blade Is pruner’s luck—a man’s arm isn’t made To reach and twist all day without some bit Of ache to take home with him when he’s quit. That wind-tan and the stubble-growth of beard That’s cropped out on his chin and gotten smeared Around his throat, they do a useful turn— They temper cold and dull the bright snow-burn.

It snowed this morning when he went away With those big bear-paws on—it snowed all day; And though his sleeves and neck are soaked a lot With all the constant reaching up, it’s not So bad—the snow—for when it’s four feet deep Or so, a pruner doesn’t have to keep That raking stretch. Another day and night, If it keeps up like this, will fix it right. All yesterday it rained—he didn’t stop, Just went ahead and pruned—and let it drop. The day before was sun—a blinding glare On snow—it’s amber goggles then and they’re Forever getting fogged. Of course a day Gets sort of tucked in now and then that may [Pg 25] Not be so bad, although they’re pretty few, But good or bad there’s little else to do In winter-time, but prune. And it is plain, A man who loves his trees won’t stop for rain Or cold or driving snow or dazzling sun Until the job he started on is done.

To any man like that a tree is bound To mean more than a root shoved in the ground, For they are his, his own, his pets—just like His kids. They’re part of him and so they strike Into his heart. He’s cuddled them, he’s stuck With them through all the ups and downs of luck; Instead of chicken-pox he’s had to fight Anthracnos, winter-kill and scab and blight; He knows his rows—what every tree’s been through, The one’s who’ve done him proud and strugglers too. And he remembers how, four years ago— That day the big freeze came with all the snow, He found the weighted limbs of some of them All split and broken from the mother stem.

That’s why there’s something human enters in To pruning trees—it almost seems a sin [Pg 26] Sometimes to lop off here and lop off there The wood you’ve coaxed with such a heap of care; Like punishment it seems, and though it’s wise, Those fruit-spurred boughs are hard to sacrifice. And when he takes a tree and prunes the wood The way it should be done for that tree’s good, He does not see the severed sticks that show Black-twisted there upon the trampled snow— To him, each one’s a green-leafed bough that’s gone, With all its scented crimson apples on.

His blouse is steaming now—hung on a chair Before the kitchen-stove—she put it there. She’s humming cheerful-like, tonight it’s toast And coffee and potatoes and pot-roast; He will forget his shoulder after while, And when he’s filled and dry—he’ll smile.

[Pg 27]

SNOOTS

Say—have you ever given thought To snoots—just snoots? Most likely not! There’s so much else to think about That snoots get crowded out. An uncouth thing And yet most interesting Somehow, and so of snoots I sing And of that strange, instinctive sense— Mute marvel of God’s providence!

Now take a snoot that’s prowled around Like old Pete’s there—along the ground And through the brush from log to log— The plain snoot of a common dog. How often, knocking through the wood, Deep in the maples I have stood Stock still—and watched that canny brute. Tense to the trail, by rock and root, Zigzagging now, then onward straight! Not once there would he hesitate. Eyes to the earth, alert and quick, By briar, branch and broken stick, [Pg 28] Till pausing short, with one glad bound And switching tail—his quarry found, He sprang to meet His master, crouching at his feet, At last content. And this strange thing—you call it scent

The leaves are trodden by a boot, A little later comes a snoot, And quick as thought it sniffs the air, The soil, and sifts the odors there. A hundred kinds of smells we’ll say, The mould, the moss, the worms, the clay The drying leaves, the twigs and stones, The fallen needles and the cones, The little flowers, the growing plants. The bugs, the chipmunks and the ants; And yet that sniffing snoot could tell Among all these, the one faint smell That lingered vaguely in the wake That two swift-striding boots might make.

You marvel at his skill when he, The master of a symphony, Detects one jarring note that comes Up through the beat of many drums, And tambourines and banging things, And blaring brass and whining strings; [Pg 29] You cite some instance of the kind To eulogize the human mind— To show attainment absolute! I point you to my Peter’s snoot— Upon my lap he comes to lay Its cold, damp tip, still smeared with clay.

Oh, all you hordes of furry brutes, Be glad you’re blessed with telltale snoots, So nicely tuned that with a sniff Of earth or air, you catch the whiff Of danger there. You mountain sheep, Superb upon your rocky steep; You splendid elk, far domiciled In mountain fastness, coursing wild; You bonny deer and monster moose, Brandless, unfenced, will-free and loose; You wolves couched in your rock-ribbed lairs; You blubber-padded, big-pawed bears; You foxes tunneled deep in roots, Wise was the God Who gave you snoots!

[Pg 30]

LITTLE BLACK BULL

Born in bobbing clover hay, July sun at close of day— Black and gleaming little bull Appetite all masterful. Scarcely dried—his glossy silk, When he started in to milk, Tongue a-smack and bulging tum, Filled at last—his vacuum. Soft blue hoofs and knobby pegs Soon were prancing just like legs; Got him weaned till bran he took Like a codfish bolts a hook, Till he danced in sheer delight, Till he waxed in youthful might. Dawn of day and forth he went For adventure—jubilant; Innocent and wondering eyes, All the world a glad surprise, Then they drove him down the hill In a crate—and wondering still; [Pg 31] Wondering as the world went by, Green of trees and blue of sky, What adventure—joyous, new, Little bull was going to.

[Pg 32]

MOUNTAIN TOPS

Old crater-tops! Cloud-bumped! Snow-white! Our mountains these—all day and night They show above the ridges. What? You’ve never climbed? You’ve missed a lot!

When you have known the grunts and chills, The cold, the sweat, the gasps, the thrills; And winced at dazzling snow reared high Against a dye of cobalt sky; And faced the blast that strives its best To hurl you headlong off the crest; Seen countless ranges fade into The whole vast earth-encircling blue That holds the rim of the sky’s bowl; And sniffed the clouds and watched them roll Close-packed beneath you in the sun and ride Like foaming billows at flood-tide; When you have done these things, you’ll speak With reverence of a mountain-peak.

Such friendships last—they’re not Remembered lightly nor forgot.

[Pg 33]

THE RIVER

Once I gurgled with a hiss In the glacier’s cold abyss. Dull and muffled was my song As I felt my way along Through the mystic caves of glass Far below the great crevasse. Now I greet the blessed light, Out of night and bursting white— Baby-giant—keen to forge, Loudly laughing, through the gorge; Straddling rocks and riding bumps, Brushing branches, hurdling stumps, Peevish, boiling, sluggish, slack, Lunging forward, swirling back; Leaping from a bouldered dale, Snaking through a clay-banked swale, Draining streams from every draw Down into my hungry maw, Swelling with the tribute paid— This is how a river’s made.

[Pg 34]

THE JUGGLER

You’ve seen him balanced with his staff, Far up—and giving death the laugh? The Juggler—confident and proud Above the gaping, breathless crowd! So in the gathering storm, he swayed— The Forest Juggler—unafraid! Schooled by the blasts of centuries, Proudly he looked on lesser trees, Rearing his mighty head on high Against the red-streaked western sky. Then broke the gale—the clouds unlocked, And such a wind as never rocked His stalwart trunk, now made him dance. He swayed in ancient confidence Till once he reached—too far! Then all His shaft went toppling to the fall, With grinding boughs and crunch and thud. Upripped those gorgon-roots, the mud— Wide-flung, left but a crater-hole Where it had towered—that giant bole! [Pg 35] The wind has gone upon his way, A patch of sky shows where he lay— Who juggled long and fearlessly Until a greater came than he.

[Pg 36]

NATURE’S TOTEMS

With tools rough-wrought the untaught scribe Carved deep the glory of his tribe— Amazing monsters—grotesque, stiff, With curious, quaint hieroglyph. Brave in barbaric dyes, his scroll— So left the scribe his totem-pole.

Though rotted, broken, scattered far These totems of the savage are, Proud totems—vastly mightier, The lineaments of Nature bear.

The mountain’s twisted ribs of rock Laid bare, proclaim the earthquake shock, And how it was through turmoil great Exalted to its high estate; An upturned fossil on the plain Reverts to Dinosaurian reign, Another shows his prowess gone— The advent of the Mastodon; The lopside fir is eloquent Of battling winters nobly spent; [Pg 37] The shell upon the mountain side Betrays an ancient ocean’s tide; These are the totems, cryptic, terse, We find in Nature’s universe.

[Pg 38]

MINSTRELS OF THE NIGHT

Woodland voices I have heard— Laughing waters, beast and bird; Red-squirrels jabb’ring while they eat, Cones a-dropping at your feet; Pecker diving for a worm, Ringing echoes with each squirm; Squawking jays and the palaver Of a pheasant breaking cover; But the strangest sound to me Comes when winds blow fitfully, In the darkness, like a moan— Chilling to the marrow-bone, Dying now upon the gale Like a far-off cougar’s wail. Now it rises—peevish, wild, Like the fretting of a child; With an easing wind the thing Squeaks like monkeys jibbering. Thus a leaning, scraping tree Sounds its spookish minstrelsy, When the night-wind, teasing so, Starts it rocking to and fro.

[Pg 39]

THE LONG BET

The mountain road will lead you past The shack. It’s easily told, the last Old tumbledown this side the ridge Of snags; a little bridge Is there that hasn’t yet dropped through. I don’t know how it is with you, But every time I see that shack It gets me somehow—calls me back And tries to speak. The caved-in shed Where some poor nag was fed His mighty little, and the rakes Upstanding still—and scattered shakes, Tell how they labored to deceive The man with hope. In make-believe They played a barn—and over there The several-acre clearing where A few anæmic blades of grain Still volunteer; but oh That Potter’s Field where grow In broken rows of twos and threes The little, weazened apple-trees. [Pg 40]

Mere stalks are some, that died Beside the stakes where they were tied, While others held tenaciously Their stunted semblance to a tree— Their dangling leaves are sparse And bloodless—so the farce Goes on. I know he stood that day He planted them and looked away Across his claim—beyond that draw Where all the ghost-trees are, and saw Them fade away and in their stead A smiling orchard with its red Fruit-laden boughs. At any rate He likely staked with fate What all he had—all he could get, And made his one long bet.

He staked the woman too— That calico of faded blue Still waving by the kitchen door, The shreds of curtains on the four Wee windows on the front, proclaim There was a woman in the game. Lord, how he must have strung Her on—to drag her up among Those snags! And what it must have been In winter! Think of living in That tumbly hut—eight feet of snow Outside—and ten below. Suppose the woman took her bed, Caved in, just like the shed Is now—upon her back laid flat, (The work alone would tend to that).

The mountain road will lead you past The shack. It’s easily told, the last Old tumbledown this side the ridge Of snags.

[Pg 41] Of course they had a kid. The broken go-cart shows they did, It’s shy a wheel and tongue— You’ll find it there among The weeds just by the front door stoop. It’s ten to one he’d have the croup And scarcely likely he’d get off Without the whooping-cough. Good God! It’s fiendish anywhere, But think of whooping-cough up there In winter! All that gloom— A little room With stuffy stove and candle-light, And whooping, whooping through the night.

And when the man gave in At last and found he couldn’t win, Found apples couldn’t keep alive Or thrive Or come to any good One bit more than a human could [Pg 42] Up there, and when the day Came that they went away— Packed up their leavings in a load And joggled down the mountain road, I’ll bet they both looked back And cursed that shack. And it is hard to think That even that rose-pink Of early sunrise on the top Of that old mountain had one drop Of beauty left for them. It might Be that the white Ghost-trees bespoke their mood Of helplessness and solitude That day. It’s easily told, The old Ramshackle place this side the ridge Of snags—the little bridge That hasn’t yet dropped through, Will point it out to you.

[Pg 43]

THE CAVES OF JOSEPHINE

I’m sure if one could probe But deep enough, he’d find this globe Just tunneled through with catacombs And resonant with hollow domes And yawning gulfs, abysmal spaces And divers dark, unfathomed places Where echoes die through mere excess Of nothingness.

There’s mystery in holes—a solid thing Is never half so interesting; It’s fun to poke around in them—to draw the screen Away from things long hidden and unseen, Like those in Josephine. Ten miles of thickest Douglas green The little trail winds through, That leads you to Old Gray Back with his half-closed, Crooked eye. How long he’s dosed That way—without a blink, Who knows? Until Elijah found the chink [Pg 44] That day he shot the bear— Just crippled her enough to tear Down through the rocks—a bloody track Into the big, black crack; And that was back Along there in the seventies. Dick Rawly tells the story—he’s The guide, And how he beams with pride To see outsiders rave About the marvels of his cave, As proud of every chamber, niche and shelf As if he’d chiseled it himself.

And Lord! The more you snoop Around down there, and scrape and stoop To see the things you see, The more you think he has a right to be. Dick’s different too—he says his say As if he’d learned it yesterday Instead of when he did. With all the ardor of a kid He rambles on—it’s always new To him, just as it is to you.

He tells you how the place was formed In glacial days, when waters stormed And roared and cut their channels through The very spot where you [Pg 45] Stand marveling. Then comes the change. The glaciers pass, along the range They ride no more, the streams are dried, The conflict stops. On every side Lime-laden drops begin To percolate and filter in— The long, cold sweat appears. For several hundred thousand years, Away from light, away from time, Those little drops have oozed their lime.

Relentless patience must have played Its part when all this underworld was made, And infinite variety took hand When it was planned— Or was it planned? Was it intent— Or some sublimely perfect accident That caused to be That marble-fluted canopy Above the many-pillowed throne That’s shown In brilliant, bold relief against our light In this Lost Paradise of night. And see— Upflocking toward the canopy, A-scurrying, Those baffling forms that cling [Pg 46] And swarms of pudgy shapes that ride In half-lights, side by side. And was it chance that made The Coral Garden’s gray arcade And pillared it and set in place Each tiny statuette and grotesque face; And petrified the water-falls; And hung the walls And roofs of all the halls With rows of frescoes—pendant, bright, And gleaming like a starry night; And made the sweetest chimes to ring— We heard their clear notes echoing. If it was chance, I didn’t find It so. To me it seemed a master-mind Was lurking there—some spirit born of endless night, Transfusing each slow-dropping mite Into a wonder-thing By deft, fantastic fashioning.

Dick said The place was uninhabited, Except for a few bats At times and some pack-rats That nested near the mouth—but how could he Tell what had been? To me [Pg 47] The place was just deserted—that was all! Because we heard no laughter fall, Nor voices ring, Proved not a thing.

And when The first intrusion came of mortal men, There must have been a merry muss And universal exodus Down through those dark recesses there And on to undiscovered regions where No man may hope to go. I would have witnessed such a show! Those trooping little refugees Of divers personalities In babbling groups, by twos and threes, With all their household goods—they must have moved Them all—the fact is proved Conclusively, as there’s no trace Of such effects in any place.

Perhaps the Pix went first— They’re fearsome, so I’ve heard, and cursed With nerves. And then the Nixie crew, The Pix’s shapely cousins who Are beautiful—as Nixies go, And no less slow [Pg 48] To move when trouble stirs the air. Now comes a flare Of lurid light—the rhythmic tramps Of Gwelfs who bear their swinging lamps Of cocobol; A roll Of music like bassoons— The beating wings of Dragleloons, Their patterned pinions show their sheen And glow with iridescent green— Out trails the light—a glint of scales Gives hint of flashing, rainbow tails.

Now Master Goblin falls in line, The chills are jumping in his spine, His eyeballs bulge with speechless fear, His mouth’s a slit from ear to ear. He goes galumping in his boots; Behind him thump the Dormizoots, And then the Elves. From all the crannies, nooks and shelves The Wiffles come, and scrambling Wools, And Blurbs and jibbering Gabools— They stumble, tumble—now they run, Each fumbles for the other one, Mate calls for mate— A seething flux conglomerate [Pg 49] Of cave-born entities. They pant and grunt and squeak and wheeze, They stampede, yell, And chase pell-mell. Through tortuous tunnels walled with light The pigmy pageant makes its flight, The last far turn is made, The swinging flicker-flashes fade, The clamor and the cries Are dimmed—the babbling tumult dies.

The palace rooms are dark, the halls of state, The Coral Gardens—all are desolate. No music falls— The conclaves and the carnivals, The mystic rites, The colors bathed in mellow lights, The throbbing life and mirth Of all this chambered, nether-earth Are gone. Nor will one Elf return To ring the crystal chimes or burn Strange incense at the pillowed throne, Because no Elf was ever known To tread again where mortal man Has been—nor any of the hybrid clan Who must have scampered out of there That day Elijah shot the bear.

[Pg 50]

HOBNOBBING WITH THE
FIRMAMENT

When I was just a barefoot tike I used to wonder what ’twas like Up there—oh way, way up—as high As all those screaming gulls could fly— So white against the blue; And where at evening too The whippoorwills croaked, darted, swirled, So far above my boyhood world.

Why, every youngster with two eyes Has had his dreams about the skies— My dreams have never quit Although I’m getting on a bit, So one day when it came, this chance, I took it—over there in France.

Upholstered in A furry skin— I think ’twas sheep, the coat, Or maybe cow or goat And buckled snug round the throat, With helmet, goggles—all the frills, A bird-man to the very quills;

The hills are flat, the roads are streaks, The rivers dwindle into creeks— A crazy-quilt of gay brocades And all the patches fields and glades.

[Pg 51] And thus I stood—they laughed, While I was photographed. And out before the hangar there Our gleaming Lizzie of the air— A dragon-fly—just poised to stay A moment here and then away. A little nick dug in her side Where one might stick a toe, then slide Across the top and drop Kerflop With one more roll Into the cockpit cubby-hole— From here the young Observer chap Snaps photographs and makes his map; Since you have filled his place, you are Lord High Observer of your car!

The first thing you observe is not To let your feet or legs get caught In all those shifts and sliding gears And lifts with which the Pilot steers, Yanks at the cranks and cable-things That work the rudders and the wings; And next, that life-belt should be placed Just sort of loosely ’round the waist— Superfluous no doubt, But handy when you’re falling out. [Pg 52]

The noisy motor spits and tugs In little fits of chuggy-chugs, With chuggy-chug—chug-chug—chug-chick, Now chug and chick come double quick— The stench of petrol it exhales With reeking breath. The old prop’s flails, Like some titanic tabby’s purr, Churn ’round into a deafening whir. Goliath! That’s the breed of her— You’ll think so when you catch the stir She kicks behind her in her wake That moment when she starts to make Her lovely take-off—once they’ve wheeled Her into line upon the field!

The Pilot, turning, cries “All set?” You grab like cripes and yell “You bet!” The grinning ground-men wave good-bye, And gathering speed, the dragon-fly Moves on. The turf’s a blur—so swift It flashes by. You feel no lift And yet you rise—you only know You float by seeing there below The earth receding, while the air Would gladly tear The helmet from your goggled head. You glimpse a house, a barn, a shed— [Pg 53] You only know them by their tops— The profile way of seeing stops. The hills are flat, the roads are streaks, The rivers dwindle into creeks— A crazy-quilt of gay brocades And all the patches fields and glades. And all around, the quilt is spanned By vanishing horizon-land, Where fading contours disappear In wreaths of violet atmosphere That gradually evolve into That great inverted bowl of blue.

And are you dizzy? How absurd! You’re not of earth—you are a bird. You do not have that toppling feel When all beneath you seemed to reel That day you peeped in timid fright From some cathedral’s pigmy height; You are afloat on gleaming wings, Not propped up with terrestrial things.

But look! Hold fast! With wicked tilt She’s swinging round. That crazy-quilt, The spreading earth, has dropped from view— Or so it seems somehow to you Until your tangled vision sees Fields and rivers, roads and trees, [Pg 54] Barns and houses—little town, Smiling at you, looking down. Another twist and there you view The sprawling world out under you, All right-side-up and in its place— The play-ground of the human race— Those insects whom you left to creep And work and laugh and eat and sleep. Perspectives do get twisted quite In making one’s initial flight!

But swift! Low bridge! She mounts the loop! You meet the onslaught with a stoop, And with her upward-moving course, You’re shoved against her with such force, That little seat you’re sticking to Seems fairly crushing into you. Then just as quickly, all has ceased, The sudden impact is released, You clutch to keep from dropping now, You clutch and wonder—marvel how She slowly crawls across the top, She almost stalls—you think she’ll stop! You wonder just how long ’twould take To make that trip should something break Or slip, Or should you loose your grip— [Pg 55] And if you’d strike a church or what— Or just some pleasant garden spot;

Perhaps you hope a kindly fate Would cause you to evaporate Into an atmospheric state— A sort of cosmic spirit-thing, And thus take wing, just fluttering, Up toward those pearly portals there, So nonchalant and debonair— Without all that formality Of tumbling first into a tree!

But see! She’s found an even keel At last. What joy to feel That level glide—to know you’re still On board—until, Oh Lord! Another stunt! You grab, you grunt, But breathe you can’t, Her nose has struck a fiendish slant! That chuggy-chug—has it gone dead? Or has the Pilot lost his head? He does not swerve, his aim’s exact, He’s Hell-bent for that timber-tract! Oh were there ever, ever trees With such a prickly look as these? [Pg 56] They’re coming closer up—and see, They’re getting sharper—every tree!

Now look! She zooms! Agile she springs Aloft with taut and straining wings. In one great climb she squanders all The power she gathered in her fall; She leaves the woodlands in her wake, She cuts across a marshy lake, And dipping gently, circles round Above the aviation ground, Where field-mechanics stand about To lend a hand and help you out— To ask you how you liked to drop Five thousand feet without a stop, And if the loop was all you thought A loop would likely be or not?

You thank them—tell them all how glad You were to have the ride you had, And then, a trifle limp and white, With some slight loss of appetite, And with two rather wobbly pegs As proxies for your former legs, You kick the turf up with your heel To reassure yourself it’s real— A little woozy still you feel, [Pg 57] A little dizzy— And then you take one long, last look—at Lizzie! Thus ends my tale—You’ve got it straight, The way we teased and tempted fate, Shook off this earthly dust and went Hobnobbing with the firmament. [Pg 58]

[Pg 59]

[Pg 60]

[Pg 61]

PEOPLE AND THINGS

HEARTH-GLOW

Now a man’s true heart is his home, I think, And the hearth with the crackling pine, With the leaping flames and the glowing stones, Is somehow its inmost shrine.

And the stones must come from the river’s bed— Softly colorful must they be, Like the long-dulled rose and the faded green Of an old-time tapestry.

And the light must fall with a fitful flare On the logs in the lichened wall— (Oh they must be trees where the squirrel’s shrill note Once echoed the bluejay’s call.)

And the light will leap in the man’s dark eyes From the flash of each burning brand, And the man will know from its quickening touch, The where of a woman’s hand.

And the fears that weighed till he grew afraid Will be turned into nothingness [Pg 62] With the strength that comes from a tender word And the warmth of a soft caress.

And the long-dreamed dreams of the un-lived days Out over the rainbow’s rim— They will be more real than the stuff of dreams Through her wonderful faith in him.

And it’s this and that which the hearth gives back In the glow of the crackling pine, That endears the place to a man’s own soul Till it’s somehow his inmost shrine.

[Pg 63]

THE WANT-AD OF MY SOUL

My need, which is my creed, I write upon this scroll— Be pleased, oh gracious Lord, to heed the want-ad of my soul. A cheer that does not lean upon digestion or the sun— Supports itself and never asks a boost of any one. To laugh whole-heartedly—or should ill-fortune crowd me in, Cause me to smile—give me, oh Lord, at least the gift to grin. Not quite too proud, oh Lord, to fight, but if the thing’s to do, Then tutor me to battle clean—until the round is through. If I have good to speak of men, then may that good be said— Let me not hold like miser’s gold my say until they’re dead. And Lord, I would be schooled to do with neither pomp nor fuss, Some decent thing and yet not feel so thundering virtuous. [Pg 64]

Should gossip drop around to claim my hospitality, May I not send him forth again but bid him stop with me. And if I have to fore-flush, Lord, to keep up with the brood Of Fortune’s darlings, then give me the eagle’s solitude. Make this almighty me to know that as I trudge along, Perhaps once in ten thousand times I’m likely to be wrong; And that by some miraculous, unprecedented flight Of lucky stars that shelter him, my neighbor may be right. Forbid it that my soul grow stale—let me not be defiled Nor cloyed with surfeit—let me keep the ardor of a child. Give me imagination, Lord, to see the unseen things— To know the yonder, far-off feel that comes when some bird sings. Help me to square with all the best traditions of my clan— Make me, oh Lord, a regular, real, bang-up, manly man.

Give me imagination, Lord, To see the unseen things— To know the yonder, far-off feel That comes when some bird sings.

[Pg 65]

THE BELL

I am a cat and I am cruel! But beautiful! My fur Is soft. I have deep amber eyes And a most pleasing purr. I am a plaything for a child To pinch or squeeze or pull Or to adore with soft caress, For I am beautiful.

I am a cat and I am cruel! The upper Nile knew me, Roaming and wild. Then hunters came, I was no longer free. For Egypt had great granaries, So came a plague of rats, They held us sacred like their gods For Egypt needed cats.

I am a cat. Since Pharaoh’s day I am what men call tame, But deep in me the lust for gore Is lurking just the same. [Pg 66] Stroke me, I purr—my claws relax, I drowse—but for all that The murderer in me sleeps not, Sleeps not, for I’m a cat.

My mistress too is beautiful, Blue-veined with snowy skin, She smooths my fur and cuddles me Close to her dainty chin. An amorous perfume clings to Her soft gown’s silken mesh— I only want to smell her blood And eat her pretty flesh!

I love to watch the agony Of some affrighted thing, Life ebbing scarlet, bit by bit, Through my slow torturing. I am a cat—this is my life, To be a pet until The age-long urge bestirs my soul And I go forth to kill.

Through velvet black the paws of me Touch oh so soft and noiselessly. The burning amber of my eyes Pierces the night; the rose-moon dies. I hear a twitter in the vine, [Pg 67] My throat is parched—it craves red wine. I lift a foot—and all is well Until—until—I shake my bell! For she has tied a bell on me, A bell—a bell—a bell on me, A tinkly bell to tell on me, To tell—to tell—to tell on me; The bell that foils each move I make, The bell that tells my prey awake, The single dingle jingle-bell The little tittle-tattle bell, The bell that holds my stroke in check, The cursed bell around my neck.

[Pg 68]

GOSSIP

You’ve never heard Bill Sunday speak? No more had I until last week. Yes, every mother’s son Was there—bar none, And women folks—the kids all came Just like it was a baseball game! Up to the grove on Dobson’s Hill, And there was Bill— Thumpin’, jumpin’, hell-fire Bill Right from his ranch to spill Religion till we’d drunk our fill.

Well say, Since Bill let loose that day There’s not a kid ’round here for miles But what can juggle more new styles Of double-jointed, back-talk stuff And compound cursin’ guff Than they’d have picked up with their ears In twenty years [Pg 69] From other folks. But to resume, Bill started on the temperance boom! Statistics? Gosh! Blood-curdlin’ tales— He had ’em stacked ’round there in bales, With starvin’ children, murdered wives, And drunken males with guns and knives.

The way Bill talked you would have thought Our Valley here had gone to pot And ruin from the curse of drink. But what I think Is mostly wrong with this here place Is just a simple case Of scandal! Why, drinkin’ doesn’t hold a candle To all the dirty mess that’s stirred With every slanderous word That’s rolled along—and every time It’s shoved a bit, it gathers slime. When certain people get together It ain’t the weather Worries them! Not much! It’s who the heck Deserves it hardest in the neck!

I’ve read somewhere how they could hear A little whisper ringin’ clear Across the dome Of old St. Peter’s there in Rome. [Pg 70] Well, I have heard a whisper go From Hillman’s ranch down there below The base-line road, to Eric Lane’s Then shoot across and hit MacGrain’s, From where it kept on bouncin’ till It struck the Hendricks on the hill, Then glanced and hit our house kerzip, Two days exactly on the trip! Though whisperin’s good down there in Rome, We’ve some acoustics here at home.

Accordin’ to Amanda Higgins, Jim Gillan’s wild on Mrs. Wiggins; That’s why Jim’s wife goes ’round so white And frets her heart out day and night. Accordin’ to Matilda Blink “That teacher last year used to drink— She roamed at will with Ruf MacGrore, Who was immoral to the core; That car Zeb Brinker bought for Blanche Meant one more mortgage on their ranch, While Hiram Tyler, he sets back And drives the same old squeaky hack And makes his wife and daughters face Shame and disgrace— Old Hiram who has laid away Enough to pay [Pg 71] For twenty cars— My stars!” So runs the gospel link by link Accordin’ to Matilda Blink.

Of course you can’t gainsay the claim That some small flame Of truth might be Where gossip’s smoke blows ’round so free, But oh the misery that’s begun When each poor family skeleton Is wakened from its peaceful trance And made to dance A shandigee For all the blame community.

What’s wanted most around this place Is supernatural grace. If we could find Some heavenly-antiseptic kind Of moral mouth-wash that would take A slanderous tongue and make It CLEAN—and God knows there Would have to be enough to spare For all of us—both wives and men, To take a gargle now and then— If we could ever hope To find that kind of dope, [Pg 72] Our little parson on the hill As well as Bill, Could save a precious pile Of energy and rest a while.

[Pg 73]

LOVE’S LABOR LOST

John had the “con,” the Doctor said. He stayed around the house and read Most of the time or worked at such Chores as would not exert him much And slept on the veranda where The Doctor thought was better air.

Each little thing the family knew Would make him happier, they’d do. “He won’t be with us long,” they’d say, Then scrap and wrangle on, the way That families do when rounding curves, Each getting on the other’s nerves With back-bite, spit-fire—loading full The fleeting hours per usual.

At times of utmost unction, Bill Would be the goat—on him they’d spill The general peeve and blame. Bill stood The gaff to help the common good. One day Bill up and got the flu And did what flu-folks sometimes do— [Pg 74]

He died. Three days was all he took. He lay there in a curtained nook; It hit them sort of by surprise To see him there with calm, closed eyes And flowers all ’round and all so still. They stood there looking down on Bill And sobbed as families do when caught So sudden like—they looked and thought Of all the times they’d given him Hell; And John—oh yes, poor John got well.

[Pg 75]

THE HALF UNDONE

He chose to do his stint by deed— Not words but action was his creed; When at his door some need would knock, He gave—and wasted little talk.

He never had too big a load To ease the traveller on the road; His hearth was warm—so was his bed And no one left his house unfed. He did not gossip—if he talked ’Twas well advised—he never knocked; He never knocked nor did he raise At any time his voice in praise; The little gracious things folks say, He left them out—it was his way.

He left so many out that they Who shared his roof from day to day, Went hungering in their souls the while For just a pleasant word or smile. It was as if he’d gone and made A covenant with God to aid [Pg 76] His fellowman—so far as he Could help that man materially; But as for giving from his store Those gifts the heart keeps longing for— And lacking which goes beggaring— Well that was quite another thing.

Somehow I think that such an one Leaves half his task in life undone.

[Pg 77]

THE MAN WHO POISONS DOGS

The whelp who did the trick, I think he knows— I think he feels it everywhere he goes. A dog knows he’s a dog—there’s no pretend, He starts out dog and he’s dog to the end. At that, he’s got a dog’s sense of what’s right And lives dog-loyalty according to his light. And when a man less than a dog, he knows— Though he may look like man and wear man’s clothes, He knows the scut he is beneath it all. The dog knew too—that’s why he tried to crawl Back home—up to his kennel by the shed— Dragged all the way—just like a lump of lead, Because no self-respecting, decent hound Would want to die upon his poisoner’s ground If he could get away. Just what the use Was, doing it—or what kind of excuse He had, is more than I can figure out. We raised that yellow hound—he’s gone about For five years now and he was decent stuff, And there’s no reason I know good enough [Pg 78] For what he got. A poisoner’s not the kind To say—“That yellow cur of yours—you’ll find Him here—I murdered him!” Or else—“That hound You’ve got up there—I poisoned him, I found Him running round my stable-yard today.” When he’s through with his job, he doesn’t say Those things, because it’s not a poisoner’s way— His secret’s kept between himself and God And that dumb brute that rots beneath the sod.

[Pg 79]

A AND THE

A shingled shack beneath a hill, A clump of alders—dangling still Their russet leaves and just below, A creek half-filled with ice and snow; A chicken-coop and little pens— Against the snow some rust-red hens; A cow, a child with ragged coat— And by the fence a billy-goat.

These were the things that caught my eye From a car-window passing by. To me it was a hill, a brook, A house caught in a passing look; But to the child with ragged coat It was the house, the hill, the goat. To me and to each other eye That saw as we went swiftly by, It was one rill of many rills, One hill among a thousand hills, One little man-made blotch upon A changing ’scape that’s come and gone— Oh what a difference there can be ’Twixt little things like A and The.

[Pg 80]

MELTED CANDLES

Evergreen, holly and mistletoe, Heigho and a Christmas night! Wind in the pines and drifting snow, Stars and a world of white.

Oh, the joyful Christmas music! There’s a carol—do you hear? Have you caught the thrill of gladness On this night of all the year? Golden bells and shining baubles, Spangled angels—do you see? Silvered globes and painted soldiers, Gay and gallant, gaudy soldiers, Dangling from the Christmas tree.

There are candles, gleaming candles, Down and ’round and overhead, Twinkling, blinking ’twixt the branches, Candles pink and blue and red. Christmas candles, waxen candles, Once so hard but soft’ning now, [Pg 81] Candles that the flames are melting, Tiny Yuletide flames are melting, Melting on the greenwood bough.

There is love and grace abounding In the vibrant Christmas air. Has it touched you? Has it thrilled you? Have you felt it pulsing there? Where the hearthstone of your heart is? Or have all the wintry years Only left beneath their drifting, ’Neath their cold and cheerless drifting, Cherished wrongs and bitter tears?

Is there nothing in the spirit Of the garlands and the wreathes? Is there nothing in the message That the fragrant balsam breathes? Is there nothing in the legend Of the Christ-child that can move The lifeless souls of mortals, The bleak, gray souls of mortals To forgiveness, grace and love?

Oh, the hearts that beat resentment While the Yuletides come and go, Hearts that crave one little token, Hearts too proud to have it so. [Pg 82]

Christmas magic, may it move them, Wheresoever rankle be, Melt them as the flaming beacons, As the radiant Yuletide beacons Melt the candles on the tree.

Evergreen, holly and mistletoe, Heigho and a Christmas night! Wind in the pines and drifting snow, Stars and a world of white.

[Pg 83]

HOLLY

There’s holly on our lawn—all year It grows, and when the Yuletide’s here And others from the market bring, We take from our tree’s burgeoning And with each gleaming emerald spray Our house is glad on Christmas day. Throughout the year our holly tree Tells of a Christmas that’s to be And like its own rich evergreen Keeps fresh the Yuletides that have been— One—long ago near Galilee— I’m glad we have a holly tree. [Pg 84]

[Pg 85]

[Pg 86]

[Pg 87]

MORE RHYME THAN REASON

MONDAY

Lickety-klang! Lickety-klang! Boom-a-lang! Boom-a-lang! Boom! Swishity-swish! Kettle and dish! Out of the kitchen and room! Room! Room!

Steam up the water hotter and hotter, Tin an’ enamel-ware, linen an’ camel-hair Into the boiler and tubs, tubs, tubs! Erin’s fair daughter, prime for the slaughter, Tumbled and tawny-like, hefty and brawny-like, Promptly at seven and rubs, rubs, rubs!

Mouth like a grotto! No hippopotto Rushes his ration so, shuns mastication so— No hippopotto would dare, dare, dare! Coffee and tater—into the crater, Front of stalactites, molars for back-bites Crunching away with a tear, tear, tear!

Blazes are dwindling, shove in the kindling, All the pajamas on—see how the Amazon [Pg 88] Mixes the pudding of duds, duds, duds! Skirts and chemises, shirts, B. V. D-ses, Stir them around again—unwound and wound again, Swirled in a vortex of suds, suds, suds!

Rinse ’em and ring ’em, twist ’em and sling ’em Out of the stewing-place into the bluing-place, Whiter and whiter they grow, grow, grow! One more ablution—careful, that ruchin’! Purged all the finery, pinned on the linery, Swinging away there like snow, snow, snow!

Wash-lady Bridget’s weary old digits— Would she complain of it? Fume at the strain! of it? Not if she dropped in the way, way, way! Now ends the tubbing—home to more grubbing, Back to that man of hers and that wee clan of hers, Back at the end of the day, day, day!

Shirts and chemises caught by the breezes, Fluttering nigh to her, waving good-bye to her, Gorgeous and gold in the sun, sun, sun! Aprons of gingham—how she did ring ’em, Sheets blowing billowy, hose limp and willowy, Praise be to Bridget—they’re done, done, done! [Pg 89]

Lickety-klang! Lickety-klang! Boom-a-lang! Boom-a-lang! Boom! Swishity-swish! Kettle and dish! Out of the kitchen and room! Room! Room!

[Pg 90]

GETTIN’ TO IT

When Jim gets to it he’s goin’ to fix The front door where it always sticks, And oil the hinges where they squeak And put new shingles on the leak That trickled down and ruined all The paper on the spare-room wall. He’s goin’ to take a piece of lead And mend the drain-pipe, so he said, By solderin’ up that pesky chink Down underneath the kitchen sink; And nail the loose boards on the floors And patch up all the fly-screen doors.

When Jim gets to it he’s goin’ to clean The wood-shed like you’ve never seen, And hang the hoes and rakes on racks, And shake out all the gunny-sacks, And all the empty cans and truck And old gum-boots he’s goin’ to chuck, And leave a place big enough For all the mops and brooms and stuff. [Pg 91] And oh the wood he’s goin’ to chop! When Jim gets to it there’ll be a crop Of kindlin’ that will see you through At least a dozen years or two.

When Jim gets to it he’s goin’ to take And fix his teeth so they won’t ache, Especially some molars there That’s just got wrecked through wear and tear— Their nerves had ought to first be killed And ’bout a dozen others filled. He’s goin’ to have some X-ray man Examine him if he can Find why he’s been so plagued of late Along his spinal vertebrate.

He’s goin’ to take and drown I guess ’Bout ninety kittens more or less, That make a point of hangin’ round The kitchen door and gettin’ wound Up in your feet so that you squash A kitten with each step, by Gosh!

There’s lots of things that Jim declares Each day will want some new repairs; The barnyard gate is far from straight And saggin’ pretty low of late; [Pg 92] The buck-saws will need filin’ soon The new piano’s out of tune, The wagon-reach is split and may Capsize a cargo any day.

It seems like quite a lot to do, But I suppose he’ll see it through When nothin’ else is crowdin’ him Nor pressin’ on his mind, and Jim Is feelin’ fairly fit and prime— But when it comes to that there time I guess it’s not too much to say That Jim will have one busy day.

[Pg 93]

FLIES

Wherein the reader is instructed in certain mysteries. He acquainteth himself with the multiple personages of the little drama.

Our kitchen’s full of flies an’ things, A billion very near, And though they’re tantalizin’ things, At times they’re tantalizin’ things, They give it atmosphere. A kitchen is more kitchy when The flies are everywhere, And work goes on less hitchy when, A hundred times less hitchy when There’s music in the air. When chilly their stupidity Is really quite a deal, They like the mild humidity, They much prefer humidity, It helps them uncongeal. [Pg 94]

With the advent of day a new life dawns—there is bustle and activity and all the ether is jubilant with praise.

It’s then they totter ’round a bit And gradually relax, Their wings begin to sound a bit, To sizz and sing and sound a bit Abaft their beady backs. Anon the whole community Is pulsing through the void, Each purrs his little tunity His titillating tunity With pleasure unalloyed. Some for the unwashed dishes steer, They joy to congregate Where fragmentary fishes smear. Where frequent flecks of fishes smear The surface of a plate.

After bodily comfort and satiety a care-free spirit fireth their souls to further conquest.

And how they love to wallow in A bowl of batter, oh How they do love to swallow in, To sip and sup and swallow in Those drippy dabs of dough. They’re happy and go-lucky and They’re irresponsible, They’ve predilections mucky and, [Pg 95] Most mushy-mush and mucky and They gorge until they’re full. Betimes they gallivanting go To forage where they may, With buzzy minors chanting low, With chirpy chirrups chanting low, They drone a roundelay.

Imbued with an inherent love of cleanliness, their antiseptic endeavors are pursued with almost a religious fervor.

When one is very fortunate He summons with his hums, With thrumming most importunate, Impatiently importunate, His gummy little chums. But when they’ve slaked their appetites They pause a while because The stuffed and wheezy happy mites, The puffed and greasy happy mites Desire to dry their paws. They rub their front ones violently, They rub them to the tips, They rub them very silently, [Pg 96] They slip and slide them silently Until they’re dry as chips.

How love of family together with a wholesome disposition for outdoor sports, tendeth to produce the ideal citizen.

In manner quite identical, They manicure with stress Each tiny, hinder tentacle, Each sticky, tickly tentacle That’s draggled through the mess. They’re fond of domesticity And always striving to Facilitate felicity, A frolicsome felicity, As all good flies should do. Their games are often nautical, They dearly love to plunge In milk-bowl depths aquatical, In quivery depths aquatical With lacteal lurch and lunge.

A wanton spirit of recklessness worketh dire mischief.

But when the cream is thick enough They dance along the top, Their dancing must be quick enough, Alert and spick and quick enough, [Pg 97] Forestalling any stop; In which eventuality Their limbs are soon involved In struggling with mortality, With miry, moist mortality Until they’re quite dissolved. And thus a woeful paucity Of wits within their pates, May, with their curiosity, Their curbless curiosity, Precipitate dire straits.

How one who lacketh the art of divination yet abounding in a foolish optimism, may unwarily enter into the very jaws of destruction.

For instance they’ll go hovering With lack-wit dawdling drone, And near without discovering, Detecting or discovering A lurking danger zone. Their kinsmen multifarious Are strewn upon a sheet In poses strange and various, Vituperative, various, With upturned toes and feet. They read in big, black typing there “USE TANGLE-FOOT FOR FLIES,” They see their comrades griping there, [Pg 98] Grimacing, gripping, griping there, And yet they don’t get wise.

With unavailing penitence they rue the day of woe and reckoning. Death and destruction hold the stage—the curtain falls.

And they that were so cheerupy, Who flew the air so free, Now on that surface syrupy, So sinister and syrupy, Bemoan their misery. They kick with motions panicky Until they’ve quite unlatched Their divers parts organicky, Orchestral and organicky, With feet and legs detached. Until most penitentially With slow surcease of toils, Their souls float out eventually, Evacuate eventually, Their mangled mortal coils.

The reader is admonished to a life of gentleness and charity.

And so I’ve tried to tune a verse Or so, to eulogize Our kitchen’s little universe, Unique, unnumbered universe Of busy, buzzy flies. With measures lilting, lyrical I’ve striven to describe In ballad panegyrical— [Pg 99] In part it’s panegyrical, This much despiséd tribe. And if I’ve touched the heart of you, Oh promise me you’ll try To crush that naughty party of you, That pugilistic part of you And NEVER swat a fly.

[Pg 100]

A DINO’S AURA

Now Cloud Cap’s near to Cooper Spur Hard by the timber-line, Above it looms the mountain and Below it blooms the pine.

It’s reared of logs and sits bang up Right pert upon a crag, And through the roof a chimney’s built Of hacked volcanic slag.

We gathered ’round the fireplace there— The guide, the guests and me, The Junior from New Haven and The man from Tennessee.

We’d had a rousing dinner of Spaghetti and roast-lamb, Substantially supported by A chowder made of clam.

We talked about the morrow and The perils of the hike, About the snowy crater there And what it all was like. [Pg 101]

We got along to bergschrunds and Erosion and seracs, And that kind of queer explosion when A nervous serac cracks.

We figured out how long ’twould take (We all submitted plans) To parcel-post a glacier’s ice By shipping it in cans.

We talked of starry nebulæ, Auroras, comets’ tails, Toads found alive in sandstone rock And ice-imprisoned whales;

Suspended animation and The tribe of Dinosaurs, (Just here the man from Tennessee Passed ’round some good cigars);

We stated and we countered in A wordy-wise delirium About the reptile Dinosaur And mammal Dinotherium.

In short we talked of everything That people talk about When sparring for a last word more To help the conflab out. [Pg 102]

We sprawled a bit, we yawned and stretched, We lumberingly arose And brought a most loquacious night Abruptly to a close.

A dozen moments afterwards, A dozen drowsy heads Had hit a dozen pillows on A dozen downy beds.

For prostrate with their hikings were A dozen pair of shanks As they slept the sleep of Vikings ’neath The wood-rat riddled planks.

The old Inn shook and trembled with A rat-a-tat-a-tat, As all the blustering four winds blew Like Great Jehoshaphat—

Like Blazes blew and Blitzen, banged The window-sash till sud- denly the thing just opened with One gosh-almighty thud.

Then quickly—as if conscious of Such ill-timed, boorish riot, Those shrieking, spiteful, frightful winds Became most meek and quiet; [Pg 103]

And in the lull there rolled a dull, Strange gurgle in my ear And through the window-space I saw A monstrous thing appear—

A snow-white critter, giant-high, With trunk and pussy’s paws— In short his make-up seemed exempt From all of Nature’s laws.

A husky, tusky Titan growth With squidgy, squinty eyes— I drew the covers closer up— The creature said “Arise!”

“Not so, old Scout,” I squiddled out, “Bed’s good enough for me!” His trunk moved slowly toward my bunk, The monster said “We’ll see!”

“Then who are you and what’s your game?” (I tried to be as calm as A man can be while shivering In only silk pajamas.)

“To thus intrude your presence rude, You big Albino cur!” “What’s that!” said he, “You don’t know me— I am a Dino, Sir!” [Pg 104]

“A Dinosaur? The heck you are! From your get-up I’ll swan You’re what our scientific sharks Have dubbed a Mastodon!

A rare, old wooly specimen ’Mongst fossil Pachyderms!” “For what they claim I’m not to blame, I have no knack at terms;

“I only know I say what’s so, A Dino’s what I be— Because your experts get things wrong— That doesn’t bother me.

“I am a Dino—or to be A little more exact, I am a Dino’s aura, Sir! A Dino’s ghost in fact!

“I overheard your talk tonight About our ancient clan— I grew absorbed, I got a hunch, Thinks I ‘At last—my man!’

“You spoke of ice-imprisoned whales— Oh little did you know The way that touched my heart that pulsed A million years ago— [Pg 105]

“My other heart that lies so still Within my frozen fur— My other heart upon the hill Deep in yon glacier.

“Oh could I break that crystal mold Where I’ve been doomed to freeze Down in that gloom and bitter cold For untold centuries,

“I’m sure my heart would pulse again, Those haunches limber grow, And I could roam as once I did— Once in the Long-ago!

“There is an ice-cave known to none, Leads to that Mausoleum, And he that was that other me Rests there where you shall see him.

“So come and look—perhaps you could Evolve some keen device To extricate my stiffened shanks From out that flux of ice,

“And I will bear you back, I swear, As I’m a Dino’s spirit, To this here shack before the crack Of daylight—never fear it!” [Pg 106]

“But Brother—” here you will observe How friendly we’d become, “For me to go up there tonight With You—is going Some!

“And such a task! What could I do? ’Twould weigh so mighty on My mortal shoulders—and besides I’ve but my nightie on!”

“Why don’t you see” replied the wraith, “What faith I’ve got in you— Who’d parcel-post a glacier’s ice In cans—what can’t you do?

“Some high explosive you could get Like dynamite and blow Me out from all my frigid plight— It could be done, I know.”

“It could be done,” I said, “but then The risk you run is heightened— The dyna-MITE blow bones and all— And then again it mightn’t!”

I looked to see—perhaps the pun Had punched his ponderous thinker— His countenance was passive quite, He never winked a blinker. [Pg 107]

But then his wraithy nut, I ween, Was shadow-celled—not solid, Hence this hiatus in his bean, His manner grave and stolid.

“This dynamiting Dinos is Quite risky in the main— Although you haven’t much to lose And quite a bit to gain!”

“I’ll chance it—come!” the Dino said, “There’s little time to lose— We ghosts you know, can only romp While other people snooze.”

His trunk galumpled toward my bunk, It snoodled till it found me, Then with a firm but gentle squeeze It wrapped itself around me;

It lifted me into the air Out toward the window-sash— The lamp upon the table there Fell with a telltale crash,

Which roused my next-door neighbor up, The man from Tennessee, Who with his light came rushing in To learn what it could be. [Pg 108]

Of course no wraith can stand the light— It must have made him sore To have his trunk dissolve in night While I sprawled on the floor.

As for the man from Tennessee And what had just occurred— With me in my pajamas there, I told him not a word.

I told him nothing for I knew He’d never understand— I asked him just to get a rag And wrap my bruiséd hand.

[Pg 109]

JUST CAT

We have a cat of common gray— In fact a plain and everyday Old Tab—to be exact I’d say She’s common in most every way.

She’s common in her manners quite, She’s never known the word “polite,” When dining with her neighbors, might To her cat mind is always right.

She’s common in her diet too— Cheese, liver, milk, or cold beef-stew— And when at last she finds she’s through, She licks her chops as most cats do.

She’s common for the reason that No chipmunk, gopher, mouse or rat Is sure she won’t cave in his slat To decorate our kitchen-mat.

She’s common in the way she’ll toy With life—decoy and then annoy And torture with cool, fiendish joy The thing she would at last destroy. [Pg 110]

She’s common in the motherly Devotion with which she can see Her kits lick up the blood—to be Eventually as cruel as she.

She’s common in the attitude Which she’s persistently pursued Toward rearing up a meowing brood— Twice every year the stunt’s renewed.

She’s common in the view she’d share With all those poor folks who declare That the community should care For all the young they choose to bear.

Indeed so common is she here, That should we count each little dear That’s littered every fiscal year, (Her seventh winter’s drawing near),

Allowing six to every score, (At times it’s less but mostly more), The tally would not figure lower Than somewhere say—near eighty-four.

But as four out of every six Are ferried ’cross the River Styx And swiftly rendered good for nix Before they register their kicks, [Pg 111]

And whereas those that still remain In order to relieve the strain And thus assuage a mother’s pain Until her grief is on the wane,

Are likewise held beneath the spout, Or soon or later parcelled out To someone who beyond a doubt Enjoys the feel of cats about,

It will be fitting to observe That we have done our best to serve This purring matron through each curve Of her plain, boundless, common nerve.

We’ve done our best—as one may see, To quell each base antipathy, That she—our Tab might still be free To rear her endless progeny.

[Pg 112]

DANGER!

Look out! Don’t touch me, man, I’m sore! I’m ulcerous—I’m more, I boil, I fume, I sizzle, I’m Cantankerous to the core.

A blister that is being shaved, A wild cat up a tree. A chestnut-bur with every spur An exposed nerve—that’s me!

I am the heat that turns to flame When in Fate’s glass is caught The world’s choice store of toughest luck And focused on one spot.

What’s wrong? Why, eighty dozen things, Each one of which would stall An ORDINARY man—it’s just My rotten day, that’s all!

What’s that? Cheer up? Say that again! No, don’t—just—go away! I’ve never killed a man before— I mustn’t start today.

[Pg 113]

A PAGEANT OF THE TREES

When the Man of Galilee spoke of “The Tree of Life” the metaphor was used advisedly. Is not a tree the very essence of life unfolding hour by hour and day by day—the harbinger of beauty on mountain and plain, the salvation of the waste-places, the antithesis of all monotony? The tender green of young trees in the sunlight, the golden laughter of autumn boughs, the loneliness of leafless trees against the sunset sky, the mystery of solemn contours drenched in moonlight, the cold, white loveliness of trees in winter—what would earth be without these things? And could the mind of man conceive a treeless heaven?

When the Great Love has stirred your soul and you are one with the Tribe of Trees through the blood-brotherhood of common understanding, you will see a deal of this humanity of ours mirrored in the multifarious tree-life of our western hills. Gird yourself with an open mind, take Fancy with you and go forth—learn of the old men, chat with the gossips, question the seers, ponder the heraldry of their ancient totems—do these things and you will return with Wisdom, and Joy will dance in the heart of you. [Pg 114]

[Pg 115]

THE FOREST

We are the hosts innumerable who ride Upon the hills—who stride The plains and surge upon the mountainside. We are the onward-sweeping tide Of ceaseless growth, the countless entities Of all the rolling, emerald seas Of timber-land—we are the Trees!

The dam who suckles us is Earth, She gives us birth And when Our night is come, she claims her own again. We live to grow and to this end Recurring seasons lend Their favor; Winter comes, our labors cease, It is a time of cold, white peace; When Spring walks jubilantly through the land We know the hour of increase is at hand; Then stirs our forest-heart and sap runs free— The sap which is the life-blood of a tree. Our skin is bark, and fiber is our flesh And through the pores of every fresh [Pg 116] Green leaf, we breathe. Our good? Is to make wood; To hold in check the floods that devastate; To mediate Between the Heavens and the Earth, That there shall be no dearth Of water nor excess—yet still enough Stored in our forest floor of matted duff To save the land from barrenness, And when we tender less Than this, or stop From making wood, we’re dead! In time, we drop, And when we drop, we rot. Such is our lot; our lives are fraught With much vicissitude, not always free To shape our destiny— A tale where each slow-born event Is moulded by environment.

And there is stuff Enough of drama if the rough, Rude story were all told—a stage Where age- Old patriarchs make way For jostling, upstart youth and gay, Bepainted courtezans and those who weep With trailing tears; and anchorites who keep [Pg 117] Their solitary trysts; and those who sing; And gossips bent in whispering; Defiant wretches of the sod, Hurling invective at their God; Or those whose arms in priestly-wise Turn supplicating to the skies, Or stoop to bless With benediction and caress; And gnarled hags And misshaped monsters of the crags; And moon-white hosts Of beckoning ghosts.

With wild, spendthrift magnificence The stage is set—immense And primal. Flash And flood and thunder-crash, Devouring flame and scattered dead And silences that hang like lead. Stuff Enough for drama if the rough Rude story were all told; A tale as old As dusk, as new as dawn— The play is always going on— The curtain’s never drawn.

[Pg 118]

THE SEQUOIA GIGANTIA

I am the oldest and the biggest thing That lives—a link forever lengthening, That binds the vanished THEN fast to The fleeting NOW. I grew— Each ’circling ring bespoke a year, Recording there My prospering—or marked perchance Some hindering of circumstance. This towering shaft in armored front Of thickest bark, has borne the brunt Of frost and flame; it has endured Through countless plagues and is inured To all the ravagings Of crawling things.

My grizzled head has glimpsed the wax And wane of comets and the tracks Of trailing meteors; and I Have watched across the sky Of time, Young nations rise and reach their prime And then grow dim again. I was a sturdy sapling when Gray Egypt reared the slave-hewn stones That hearsed the bones Of Rameses; and full two thousand folds and more Had sealed my red heart’s inmost core When He drew breath— The Christ of little Nazareth.

I am the oldest and the biggest thing That lives—a link forever lengthening, That binds the vanished THEN fast to The fleeting NOW.

[Pg 119] I’ve kept my long-established place And I am solid—crown to base; My heart is sound, my bole is straight, My limbs hang with an even weight, I do not sag and there is no Near gully where the freshets flow To undermine my roots. God planned It so, and by his grace I’ll stand Against the centuries still. So will I fill My destiny— To be A messenger—to carry on, to give Tomorrow’s children who shall live When this fair present’s passed away, The legend of my yesterday.

[Pg 120]

A SPRUCE’S ROOT

I am the grisly claws Of this crestfallen spruce that was. Almighty tall he grew and straight— I bore his Lordship’s weight For some odd centuries, and great It was to see a tree so fine In bulk and splendid in design. His portly tons increased with age While I sprawled in the cellarage, And when winds tossed his noble head I knew how shallow was my bed, For in my youth I led A rambling life, quite free from toil; I sucked the soggy surface-soil, I did not deem it worth The while to pierce the deeper earth To make my base a solid thing Against the days of reckoning. My tangled talons forked far out, They squirmed and twisted round about, They radiated from my crown— They went along but never down.

[Pg 121] Once now and then some minstrel breezes strolled Our way—they bowled Old-timers down. The ground Was strewn with windfalls all around; A rendezvous For every breeze that blew For miles—a test I’ll warrant for the best Of trees and doom for all the rest. Great strapping fellows—hale and well To look upon, but how they fell! A crack! A bump! A splintered, jagged stump! And how the pride of some did smart To have a rotted heart Torn open thus—relentlessly exposed! Meanwhile his Lordship posed— The peer without a flaw! And he was held in very proper awe— He saw his rivals snapped like straws, And still he stood—while I dug in my claws.

I knew that it would come—some gust would blow To spill him low. His great bole swayed And trembled like a barley-blade, His lifelong balance-line he tottered past— The die was cast, [Pg 122] For there was no rebound. The ground Ripped as he rocked And with the crash my roots unlocked.

In such a wise—upturned by fate, I was exalted from my low estate. I am a monstrous thing to see, A flat, misshapen prodigy Of towsie tentacles and mud and stones And twisted bones— A ghastly secret raised to smear This forest nobleman’s career.

[Pg 123]

THE DOUGLAS FIR

By crowding upward toward the light Day and night, We lift (the lifting never stops) Our panoply of towering tops. We are all height and gloom; We have no room, No place For our own brothers in the race For light; if they can not keep pace With us, nor reach as high, They die!

Our lancet-stems are clean like stalks of grain, Thus we maintain Our creed, which is to rise In unspoiled beauty toward the skies— We make no compromise! Across the fire-swept areas our seeds Are blown, to drop among the weeds. A little while they lie And germinate, and by and by WE spring—a sapling here—and there— And everywhere, [Pg 124] Elbowing in Through chinkapin And rhododendrons and the crush Of maple brush; Before we know, We’ve grown into a forest, while below We glimpse the copse And see the tops Of things That have become our underlings.

There are no thicker stands Than ours, in all the Northwest lands— By grace of rivalry we grow so straight, And thrive and dominate.

Our lancet-stems are clean like stalks of grain, Thus we maintain Our creed, which is to rise In unspoiled beauty toward the skies.

[Pg 125]

THE TAMARACK

Among the evergreens I grow All summer long—they do not know— I look so much as if I were An honest upright kind of fir. I even think they envy me, My fronds show such a filigree Of needlework, all interlaced— They do not know I’m double-faced. I am as straight as any lance And so I win their confidence; I know their inmost secret things, I hear their softest murmurings, I listen and maintain my mien— They think I am an evergreen!

But when the summer goes, October knows! October knows! For then my needles turn to gold, I stand a traitor to the fold, I am the turncoat of the pack— The yellow-flaming tamarack! [Pg 126] I hoist my shining staff, I give them all the laugh, Until my golden needles drop And sober up. I’ve had my fling— Next spring When I am seen Again, I’ll be an evergreen!

[Pg 127]

THE MONTEREY CYPRESS

The rocks and sands of Monterey— They Nourished me Beside the sea. My age? It matters not— It was enough to batter me a bit; I’ve got My own credentials of what’s what. The way my flattened trunk is worn Shows well enough I was not born Into this planet yesterday; whoever will Can count my rings the day I fall—until That time, the secret I have kept Shall sleep as it has slept.

Had fate dealt otherwise, I might have been Bestowed in safety with my kin To landward there, a half-mile in— Most orthodox and prim In trunk and limb. For such an orthodoxy, bah, who’d give Two grains of sand—they do not live! [Pg 128] They’ve nothing to combat. I get The first-hand give-and-take; the wet, Flung spray, the savage shoulder-drive Of unspent blasts—on these I thrive.

And then I watch—for me The sweep of sea, Unbroken, beautiful. I get the first Of everything. I see the burst Of evening clouds unrolled Upon a palpitating field of gold. Shot through with fiery javelins that dart Up from the sun’s red heart. So passes out my day. My night Is moon and mist and light Of stars—I keep The sweep Of sky and sea— Which somehow seems all made for me.

[Pg 129]

THE MADRONA

When my skin is newly green, When it’s turned a copper sheen, When it’s flushed to ruddiness like rich, old wine, Seek me in the wilderness, Seek me in my gleaming dress, Seek me in the shadows of the covering pine.

Lace of leafy malachite Letting in the splashing light, Dappling all my full, round limbs with leopard gold; Lovely as a mottled snake, Grace in every curve I make, Amorously beautiful my arms unfold.

Never was a gypsy maid More audaciously arrayed, Never half so ravishing or so fair— Topaz clusters, look at them, Set in Autumn’s diadem, Dazzling in the darkness of my thick, green hair.

[Pg 130]

THE YELLOW PINE

I do not like the cloistered wood And little good I find in forest gloom, I much prefer the elbow-room Of well-spaced groves, earth kempt and free Of undergrowth; to be Respectfully removed, with green And pleasant interludes between, And in the middle distance see My fellows grouped fraternally Against a haze of blue; beyond, a maze Of trunks receding till they all Seem drawn together in a wall Where every tree Is lost in dark uncertainty.

A strange Unearthly beauty I have known When like a hyacinth full-blown I’ve stood Upon a winter morning in the wood.

[Pg 131] Or better still The isolated grandeur of a hill, Just as the day is done, To watch the sun Hit full my western side And splash my alligator’s hide Of burnished copper scales with golden light; To see me so, against the purple night Banked high upon some eastern range, Is well—but there is yet a strange Unearthly beauty I have known, When like a hyacinth full-blown, I’ve stood Upon a winter morning in the wood Transfigured in the snow, Until the wind would blow And then I’d find myself a tree again.

[Pg 132]

THE BRUSH

On every fire-swept blotch we stick, We are the thick Impenetrable brush— The nondescripts who rush To claim the open. We’re the mass— We have no cliques, we have no class; We crowd and push, Tree and bush; Who keeps our frenzied pace Is welcome to the race.

The affable spiræa likes To bob her ivory spikes, Hobnobbing free With such a tolerable company. The dogwoods do not hold Aloof from mingling with our fold; The snowdrop crowd Seem very proud To dangle in the dancing light Their pretty balls of white; [Pg 133] And if the willows do not care To share Our comradeship, they’ve kept their secret well. So with the snarling chaparral And manzanita with her thin, Red, scaling arms—and burry chinkapin. We do not ban That painted courtezan, Vine-maple, she whose fingers clutch Each place they touch. We do not fuss— Like other crowds, she’s part of us; As is the tremulous And quaking aspen; each little troop Of goldenrods; each whispering group Of girlish alders and the countless breeds Of weeds.

After our kind, we live; Week after week we give Our dower Of fruit and flower In little or largess Accordingly as we possess. In Autumn we hold carnival And over all The hills, our many-patterned carpet lies Bright with a thousand dyes; [Pg 134] Rich-tufted plush Of brush, Deep-grained and thick; this covering Each year we bring— A dress Of wildest loveliness To merge in beauty more and more The ancient forest floor.

[Pg 135]

THE TIMBER-LINE

We were not meant for forest life— Not we! we chose the strife Of high adventure—took our luck Here on the rocks and here we’ve stuck We are the pigmies of the spurs— The little warriors!

Perched on these crags, we hurled Our challenge to the world. The wind heard our defy And blew till all the sky Grew purply-black and thundery. Uncommon wroth was he, When like a rumbling blunderbuss He tried to topple us, But wallowed flat—we were too short To fall! And it was merry sport Upon our jagged floor To see him wrestling there; a score Of holds he tried and thought each bout Would tire us out. [Pg 136]

Oh Lord, The way he stormed and roared! Then desperate he tried to tear Us limb from limb—to wear Us down upon his rack, A-bending back Our arms, so we would cry “enough!” We were too tough To crack! Then came the snow—so light At first, but soon its white Dead weight in silence crept Upon our shoulders and we slept The sleep that no spring wakes, But only summer breaks, When with her melting hand she takes Our blankets off and shakes The dripping fleece into the flow Of rushing torrents far below.

Thus we are stooped by weight of snows And twisted by each wind that blows; Our arms are gouged and shot By sharp-edged sands the winds have caught And driven home; our trunks are gashed And riven where the lightning flashed, And little increase may we show, So brief a season do we grow. [Pg 137] Though Time’s attrition has been spent In our grotesque disfigurement. Still we can lift our flattened heads In pride, for we are thoroughbreds. We have not flinched and we can show At what far heights a tree can grow. We are the pigmies of the spurs— The little warriors Who left the haunts of fir and pine To mark the topmost timber-line.

[Pg 138]

THE GHOST-TREES

We are the stricken—those who died But did not fall. Once, side by side, We burned and bled— We are the countless standing dead. Not like the Capuchins, cowl-topped, Dried in their cerements, stiff-propped And postured in the charnel gloom Of some deep-caverned chapel-room, But in the full, white light of day We stand—gaunt, naked, gray— Close-locked in death, Yet ever with the breath Of life around us. We can see The quickened green of each young tree, Their bobbing heads Upcrowding at our feet; and beds Of paint-brush and the blue Of lupine. Years renew Their seasons—dust and rain and snow. For us dawns glow, And setting suns transfuse our cold And ashen palor into gold; Moons rise, and then We all are turned to ghosts again.

We are the stricken—those who died But did not fall. Once, side by side, We burned and bled— We are the countless standing dead.

[Pg 139] We look upon some mighty fir, Remembering ourselves that were; It was a lightning flash that came, And flame Encircled us. All night The sky was crimson with our light. Day dawned upon the hills—the sun rose red, It saw the dying and the dead, The vast, uncounted dead—and over all, A smoky pall That wavered in the wind. We did not fall— We did not fall, like some—magnificent in strength Who measured out their length, Still smouldering, upon the ash-heaped mat Of earth—we were not burned enough for that.

Years passed Our dried bark cracked—at last It flaked and fell. In high distress We were—gaunt in our nakedness. So have we stood— The gray ghost-brotherhood, We who have burned and bled But did not fall—the standing dead. [Pg 140]

[Pg 141]

[Pg 142]

[Pg 143]

RHYMES OF FRANCE

FROGS

We’ve called you “Frogs” my hearties, With your regimental blue, And perhaps ’twas not through lovin’ That we wished the name on you. But now that you have got it And it’s likely it will cling, There’s a chance that maybe somehow There’s a meanin’ to the thing.

Through four long fearful winters In your muggy Flanders bogs, You squatted—eating, sleeping, In your mud-holes, just like frogs. Like frogs whose spots are mingled With each grass and stone and stick, You camouflaged your hiding— You were first to pull that trick.

Like frogs you sat and squinted ’Cross at Fritzie day by day, But you were ‘tout ’suite beaucoup’ When you leaped into the fray. [Pg 144]

You left a heap of frogs’ legs In the marshes where you soaked— Where tens and tens of thousands Of your punctured Poilus croaked.

We’ve called you “Frogs” my hearties, With your spattered rags of blue, With your stumps and scars and crutches Which you’ll carry till you’re through, But well you’ve shown your fitness For the rank you got by chance, And so—once more—here’s to you, Oh you dauntless Frogs of France!

La Ferte, France, January, 1919.

[Pg 145]

TRANSITION

It rained like cats and dogs that night— The kid—he rambled on; We sat, we two, by candle-light In a tavern in Ballon. “The first I killed—that hand-made dirk, Well that’s a souvenir! I got it cheap—though that poor Turk, It cost him pretty dear.

“He’d jumped our trench—the fog was thick— Thinks I—‘one of our men’ Still I yelled ‘Halt!’—he beat it quick, And then I yelled again. And on he went—I watched him till He scrambled to the top— Says I—‘Not if I know it, Bill!’ And then I saw him drop.

“Our First Lieutenant heard me blaze And soon he came along, I stood there in a kind of daze And then he said ‘What’s wrong?’ [Pg 146]

I told him and he said ‘Good work, Suppose we have a look’— He yanked a button from the Turk, I showed you what I took.

“That night I tried and tried to pray, But something, it began To pound away inside and say ‘Hey boy—you’ve killed a man!’ I just could see his clotted head In mud—the blood it ran— Oh God—all night! while something said ‘Hey boy—you’ve killed a man!’

“You’ll go to Hell—that’s where you’ll go”— For once the kid was still— “It’s funny how it gets you so, The first man that you kill. And yet—it’s just as funny too, How killin’ seems all right When hate gets jazzin’ ’round in you, Once when you’re in the fight.

“That’s how it was the day our squad Got blowed to Kingdom Come When Fritzie’s steel plowed up the sod Down there along the Somme. [Pg 147]

My first machine-gun man stood there, As near as me to you— It tore his head off clean and bare And ripped his chest all through.

“You don’t stop much for scruples when You’ve seen a sight like that, The rest of us advanced again, Their pills came pit-a-pat. Another fell—I grabbed his gun And left him my canteen, And then I started in to run Up toward a Boche machine.

“I ducked around—for two more men That Jerry there had picked, Got in behind—and leveled when The damned thing only clicked! Down went his hand, I saw his game, He grabbed his Luger, but I swung my stock and down it came Upon his bloomin’ nut.

“That there’s the souvenir I copped, Some pretty watch—eh what! From that there time she’s never stopped— She’s Fritzie on the spot! [Pg 148]

You can’t have scruples when you’ve seen Your poor old pal go West, With blood a-tricklin’ in the mud And oozin’ from his chest.

“You carry on, you just don’t care, For somethin’ seems to tell He’s callin’ to you from somewhere— ‘Go on—and give ’em Hell!’”

Le Mans, France, January, 1919.

[Pg 149]

KIDDY OF FRANCE

Kiddy of France in your raggedy clothes Toddling along in your wooden sabots— Daddy’s old cap on his little Poilu— Now it’s all faded but once it was new— Kiddy of France with that laugh in your eyes, Tell me the secret that under it lies— Comment allez-vous today?

Kiddy—mon chérie, Je vous demande Why do you press so with that little hand? Why are you jogging along at my side? Measure for measure you stretch to my stride. Kiddy—mon chérie, now out with it, come, “Avez-vous, avez-vous—some chewing gum? Avez-vous candy?”—I thought so, go on, “Avez-vous chocolat”—yes, yes—and “bon-bon?” There now mon chérie, my little Poilu, Voilà: Your gum! And now then—que dites-vous? “Merci Monsieur”—ah you’re welcome, I’m sure A hundred times welcome, mon chérie: Bonjour!

Ballon, France, February, 1919.

[Pg 150]

SPRING—1919

What is this France of today, you ask? It’s a madhouse of homesick men, Chafing, each one, to renew his task In the land of his dreams again. France! It is khaki and France is blue And France is a green-capped Hun— Badge of the bondage he’s destined to Till the days of his debt are done.

France is an emerald rolling plain, Ribboned with winding ways, Quivering white through the fields of grain And lost in the purple haze. France is a village of dung and ducks Where the muck-brown urchins play, Rumbling all day with the motor-trucks As they roll down the old highway.

France is a hill with an ancient church— Gray towers through the poplar trees, Gargoyles a-grin from each crumbling perch At the saints on their balconies. [Pg 151] France is a window of mellow light Where the day’s last gold has died— France is a woman with brow of white At the feet of the Crucified.

France is a cap and an empty coat And a space where the embers glow— France is a grave by a shell-torn moat Where the weeds and the poppies grow. France is the ashes of yesterday And France is tomorrow’s dawn— France is a bough with a blossom spray On the ruins of Montfaucon.

Verdun, France, April, 1919.

[Pg 152]

HOMESICK

In the winter when the snow fell And this France was bleak and white, And the days turned—oh so quickly To the cold and cheerless night, I was homesick.

When the rains came, ceasing never, And the earth was all a mire, And we tried to crowd the gloom out With our puny fagot fire, I was homesick.

Now it’s summer and the poppies Are a-flaming on the hill— It is France in all her glory And the larks are singing, still I am homesick.

Allerey, France, May, 1919.

Transcriber’s Notes:

The cover image was created by the transcriber, and is in the public domain.

The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up stanzas and so that they are next to the text they illustrate.

Typographical errors have been silently corrected.

*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 64548 ***

BY SCARLET TORCH AND BLADE

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

THE OPEN SPACES

BY SCARLET TORCH AND BLADE

BUILDERS OF HIGHWAYS

OREGON SNOW

THE PRUNER

SNOOTS

LITTLE BLACK BULL

MOUNTAIN TOPS

THE RIVER

THE JUGGLER

NATURE’S TOTEMS

MINSTRELS OF THE NIGHT

THE LONG BET

THE CAVES OF JOSEPHINE

HOBNOBBING WITH THE FIRMAMENT

PEOPLE AND THINGS

HEARTH-GLOW

THE WANT-AD OF MY SOUL

THE BELL

GOSSIP

LOVE’S LABOR LOST

THE HALF UNDONE

THE MAN WHO POISONS DOGS

A AND THE

MELTED CANDLES

HOLLY

MORE RHYME THAN REASON

MONDAY

GETTIN’ TO IT

FLIES

A DINO’S AURA

JUST CAT

DANGER!

A PAGEANT OF THE TREES

THE FOREST

THE SEQUOIA GIGANTIA

A SPRUCE’S ROOT

THE DOUGLAS FIR

THE TAMARACK

THE MONTEREY CYPRESS

THE MADRONA

THE YELLOW PINE

THE BRUSH

THE TIMBER-LINE

THE GHOST-TREES

RHYMES OF FRANCE

FROGS

TRANSITION

KIDDY OF FRANCE

SPRING—1919

HOMESICK

BY SCARLET TORCH
AND BLADE

HOBNOBBING WITH THE
FIRMAMENT