The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Blood of Rachel, a Dramatization of Esther, and Other Poems

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Title: The Blood of Rachel, a Dramatization of Esther, and Other Poems

Author: Cotton Noe

Release date: January 12, 2011 [eBook #34936]

Most recently updated: January 7, 2021

Language: English

Credits: Produced by David Garcia, Christine Aldridge and the Online

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BLOOD OF RACHEL, A DRAMATIZATION OF ESTHER, AND OTHER POEMS ***

"I will not come

At his command. I have a royal heart

And will not thus disgrace the Persian throne."

The Blood of Rachel

A Dramatization of Esther

AND OTHER POEMS

BY COTTON NOE

Author of "The Loom of Life"

JOHN P. MORTON & COMPANY

INCORPORATED

LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY

1916

COPYRIGHT 1916

BY COTTON NOE

All producing rights reserved, including photo play.

Permission to produce must be obtained from the author.

To

HONORABLE MOSES KAUFMAN

From whom I differ on some political and religious

questions, but whose warm friendship and

keen literary appreciation have been a

source of much inspiration to me,

particularly in the writing

of this drama.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

The Blood of Rachel

1

The Old Dog Irons

79

The Age Electric

82

Grandmother Days

86

Just to Dream

88

Amnemon

90

A Romance of the Cumberland

102

Morning Glories

111

Christmastide

112

Kinship

113

Precocity

114

The Secret

115

A Rhymeless Sonnet

116

Ambition

117

Opportunity

118

Holiday Thoughts

119

The Old Year and the New

120

Fellow Travelers

121

James Whitcomb Riley

122

Cale Young Rice

123

Pilate's Monologue

124

The Virile Spirit

128

Bluebird

131

An Autumn Minor

132

Slabs and Obelisk

133

On Broadway

134

An Ember Etching

137

A Tragedy in Birdland

140

PERSONS OF THE DRAMA

AHASUERUS

King of Persia

VASHTI

Queen of Persia

ESTHER

Second Queen of Persia

HAMAN

Premier

MORDECAI

A Jew, afterwards Premier

ZERESH

Wife of Haman

MEHEUMAN

A Chamberlain

ABAGTHA

Another Chamberlain

AHAFID

Court Poet

SMERDIS

Court Fool

SAADI

Young Court Poet

PARSHANDATHA

Lady in Waiting to Zeresh

ZETHAR

Lady in Waiting to Vashti

Chamberlains, Ladies and Gentlemen of the Court, Heralds, Royal Dancers, Nubian Slaves, Waiters, and others.

The Blood of Rachel

ACT I

SCENE I

Place—Shushan, the Capital of Persia.

Time—478 B.C.

[A hall in the palace of the king. Enter Smerdis, the king's jester, and Ahafid, poet and minstrel to the king, from opposite sides of the hall. Ahafid is already an old man, with long grey beard and a little stooped with age. He carries a golden Persian harp on which he plays and accompanies his own song.]

Ahafid

[Sings.]

Now War has doffed his mailed coat

And Peace forgot her art;

The lute but not the bugle's note

Can stir the kingly heart;

Nights of revel and carp,

And days of sensuous rust,

How can a poet's harp

Intone a song of lust?

The king is mad. His flight from Salamis

Was bad enough. But that could be excused.

For six months now what has he done but drink,

Carouse and wallow in lascivious ease,

While subjects driven to despair with tax

Have fallen on the poisoned sword and cursed

In death the son of their once goodly king?

Smerdis

Ahafid, you do seem to think the first

Great business of a king is war. Now pray

You, why should Xerxes waste the lusty days

Of youth in bloody strife? To furnish themes,

No doubt, for dullard bards and minstrelsy.

Ahasuerus is the wisest king

That ever sat upon a Persian throne.

You graybeard fool, stupid as poets are.

Can you not see the wisdom of our king

In substitution of the flight for death,

Of feast for fight, of wine for blood? Think you

'Tis wise to wear the plaited mail of Mars

When Venus bids you to the festival

Of love?

Ahafid

You call me then a graybeard fool!

Though I have dropped the purple bloom of spring

The autumn's silvery down may indicate

The ripened fruit of wisdom which your youth

Has never tasted. Smerdis, you are blind!

My beard is white, but vision clear. The king

Does daily waste the substance of his realm,

And nightly dissipates his energies

In vices of the blood. Vashti, the queen,

The idol of her people, is in grief.

Smerdis

In grief for what? Does she too wish the king

To take the field? I know our queen is fair

Of face and most voluptuous of form.

Perhaps her grief is due to jealousy.

Would she monopolize his love, because

Her beauty is surpassing?

Ahafid

Vashti does

Not know that she is beautiful. She loves

Her country and is brave as well as good.

I dread the issue of this night. The king

Has ordered that the queen be brought before

The court, a target for licentious eyes.

She will refuse to go because her heart

Is pure. Ahasuerus, flushed with wine,

Will brook no opposition to his will.

A tragedy that never Persia knew

Will see the rising of to-morrow's sun.

Smerdis

A tragedy no country ever knew—

A woman who is beautiful, but doesn't know it's true.

Ahafid

[Sings.]

Oh, for a song to cleanse the heart

Or touch the sceptred power;

Oh, might the gods a strength impart

To meet this tragic hour.

[Exeunt Ahafid and Smerdis.]

[Enter Vashti and Zethar.]

Vashti

Oh, Zethar, do you think this night will end

The revels that dishonor Persia's king?

To-day unknown I strolled through squalid parts

Of this old city and observed the poor.

My lord, unmindful of their misery,

Has laid a heavy tax for his insane

Extravagance upon the helpless child

That begs in Shushan's streets. Not here alone,

This suffering; but Persia's peasantry,

The glory of the old empire, the heart

That once defied the world, is broken on

The wheel of tax. And all for what?

Zethar

O queen,

Always the world has had its poverty.

You shall forget the poor. One stoop of wine

Will bring you happiness. Vashti, drink.

Vashti

Forgive me, Zethar, but no wine to-night.

[Enter Meheuman, Biztha and Abagtha.]

Meheuman

[Loftily.]

Our most imperial queen, the king has laid

A banquet in the palace garden court,

The crowning act of that munificence

Toward prince and people great and small alike,

Ahasuerus now for many months

Has shown the loyal subjects of his realm.

The adornment of the court displays a rich

Magnificence of taste; the couches are

Of fretted gold and silver set upon

A pavement of mosaic inlaid stone.

The drinking is according to the law—

None can compel, each vessel is diverse,

But all of gold. Th' abundance of the wine

Shows the unstinted bounty of the king.

Our monarch's heart is merry in the cup,

And boasts that Vashti's beauty does excel

In magic power the fabled Helen's charms,

And bids us bring immediately before

The court great Persia's matchless queen!

Vashti

Meheuman, tell Ahasuerus I

Must thank his majesty since he can still

Remember Vashti's beauty, though his grace

Has lost all sense of modesty and shame.

You say his heart is merry now in wine

And that he glories with exceeding pride

Because my face is fair to look upon!

I do not doubt his tongue is eloquent;

The fiery phrase is his! Why, often I

Have heard him praise his horse in language that

Seemed kindled at the altar of the gods.

It may be that he holds me higher than

His hundred concubines.

Meheuman

Your majesty,

The king does hold his queen a goddess.

Vashti

Well,

Perhaps he thinks himself divine. Go tell

The king I do not wish to be enrolled

Among divinities. I am the queen—

He must respect me as the one who wears

The Persian crown.

'Tis scarce three years since he

Began to reign. He was Darius' son—

A king of whom the world was proud. He wooed

Me as a prince of noble blood, and I

Received his hand with dignity as well

As love. I was a princess, but I had

A heart. Long since I found that he had none.

A hundred eighty days continuous feast

He has oppressed the people of his rule

With drunken revels and with wanton waste.

And now to crown his sensuality

He sends his vulgar chamberlains to bring

Me to his palace garden that his lords

May gaze with unchaste eyes upon my form.

Meheuman, Biztha, will you tell the king

That Vashti bids him come to her if he

Would see the queen.

Meheuman

You understand

The costly hangings of the garden court

Are blue and green and white?

Vashti

Now pray you what

Significance has that? What if each couch

Is gold and silver and each goblet set

With stones?

Meheuman

The king's great love for Vashti!

Vashti

Then

He has prepared this banquet for his queen?

And does he think this is an evidence

Of love. It rather means the king's debauched.

I will not be a party to his sin.

Meheuman

The etiquette of court commands you to

Obey.

Vashti

Commands! Well, has it come to that?

But I will not obey. I am a queen!

Here! Take this purple robe and coronet,

And tell Ahasuerus to adorn

Some harlot of his harem. She will grace

The queenship of his kingdom better than

A pure and modest wife.

Abagtha

You do not know

The meaning of your words!

Vashti

Abagtha, why

Do you admonish me? Do I not know

The forfeit? Chamberlains, this message take

Licentious Xerxes from his virtuous queen:

I do not fear his wrath. I will not come

At his command. I have a royal heart

And will not thus disgrace the Persian throne.

The king that's halfway worthy of my hand

Would hate the queen that yielded to his lust.

My heart, O chamberlains, is broken, not

That Vashti's crown is lost, but oh, to see

The regal name of Persia brought so low!

I weep. The tears are for my country. Go!

[Exeunt Vashti, Abagtha, etc.]

[Curtain is lowered to denote the passage of six years.]

SCENE II

[Outer hall in palace. Throne room back concealed by curtain. Queen Esther, disguised by loose dress thrown over royal robe and head and face below the eyes hidden by mask, approaches the door where Mordecai, the Jew, is standing.]

Mordecai

Ah, Esther! Though your queenly robe you do

Conceal, I know that regal gait. Before

I ever looked upon these palace walls,

When you were yet a little child beyond

The purple peaks, where shepherds led their flocks

In pastures green, I often dreamed that you

Would one day wear a golden coronet

And sit in majesty upon a throne.

Esther

[Dejectedly.]

Four years I have been queen, which time I have

Not heard the voice of any one I love;

And though disguised, I hardly dare to speak

My heart even to you. This palace is

A gloomy prison cell. The Persian crown

Is meaningless to me. The hundred gems

That blaze upon its field of gold are dull

And heavy lead. I would exchange it all

For but a glint of sunshine on the hills

Where I was born. But why this interview?

Mordecai

My royal niece, I know that you are queen.

Esther

A queen? But what of that? Though of my blood,

You can not even look upon my face.

What would you have?

[Wailing without.]

Mordecai

My daughter, do you hear

The cries of anguish that disturb the peace

Of Shushan's streets? Your people everywhere

Are clothed in sackcloth. Read the king's decree!

[Handing her paper.]

Esther

[Reads.]

"It has been written and commanded by

Ahasuerus, emperor of all

The East, and sealed in every tongue with his

Own ring—the royal seal—that governors

And princes and lieutenants, everyone

Within the Persian rule, shall make and cause

To die and perish every Jew, both young

And old, the women and the children, rich

And poor alike, and forfeit all their goods.

This is Ahasuerus' sovereign will

And shall be done and executed in

The month of Adar on the thirteenth day."

Oh, God! It is Ahasuerus' seal.

Mordecai

But Haman's hand.

Esther

Why does the premier hate

The Jews?

Mordecai

Because the children of the true

And living God will never bend the knee

To heathen pride. He hates the Jews because

Your uncle is a child of Abraham

And will not do obeisance to a son

Of Baal. Esther, though I made you queen,

I plead not for the life of Mordecai,

But for the sacred blood of Israel.

You alone can intervene. Go straight

Before the king and make demand that he

Reverse this law that puts the Jews to death.

Esther

A Persian king can not reverse his own

Decree. Besides, the queen who goes into

The presence of her lord unless by his

Express command, must sacrifice her life,

Except through some unguarded impulse he

Extends his golden sceptre that she live.

I can not go unto the king.

Mordecai

Your life

Is forfeited already, child; you are

A Jew.

Esther

You did conceal my blood nor dare

Reveal my lineage now. Your own deceit

Has brought this death upon the house of Israel,

Nor will Jehovah hold you guiltless in

The hour of doom.

Mordecai

Esther, if you keep

Your peace when Rachel's children wail and cry

For help, deliverance will arise

Unto the Jews but you shall be destroyed

And all your father's house.

Esther

Depart.          [Sound of trumpets within.]

The king

Is on his throne. I go, and if I die,

I can but perish. Peace to Israel.

[Exit Mordecai.]

[The curtain back rises and discloses Ahasuerus on his throne surrounded by court. Esther approaches to center of hall before the king, and extends her hands as though supplicating. The king seems dazed for a moment and then deeply moved; slowly he lifts the golden sceptre and extends it toward the queen who approaches and touches it.]

Ahasuerus

Why did you, Esther, O most beauteous queen,

Thus dare to come unbidden to the king?

'Twas jealous Death unbarred the royal door

That he might claim you for his paramour?

Your innocence and charms have saved your life!

Esther

[Innocently.]

My lord, how now was I in danger? Ah,

You know I am your loyal wife? I would

Not be your queen alone. The crown is naught

Compared to pleasures of companionship.

O Xerxes, may not Esther share your joys

Of wine and song? Too long you have denied

That which I covet most—to be beside

My king.

Ahasuerus

There is no favor, Esther, I

Would longer hold from you; even to half

My kingdom, tell me what you most desire,

And I will give it you.

Esther

My lord, I have

Already spoke my heart, but you will not

Believe. To test Ahasuerus' love,

I have a favor I would ask of you;

But first that my most gracious lord may know

His queen has taste and skill as well as charms,

I will prepare a banquet for the king

With my own hands. You are a judge of wine,

And every dish that graces banquet halls.

To-morrow, let Ahasuerus come,

And bring his premier Haman, who no doubt

Can tell a heron from a hawk, and if

My lord shall praise my art, and I

Find favor in his sight, I will make known

My dearest wish.

Ahasuerus

Oh, Esther, you have pleased

Your king already far beyond what he

Had ever hoped. To-morrow night at six!

[Music and revels. Esther retires.]

[The king and retinue retire in opposite direction. Haman and followers pass out front where Mordecai sits by the gate, together with others. All except Mordecai salaam, but the Jew remains stiff, looking Haman defiantly in the face.]

[Curtain.]

SCENE III

Home of Haman—two days later.

[Enter Haman, Zeresh, and Parshandatha.]

Haman

My star grows brighter with each setting sun;

The lowly child of old Hammedetha

Is first among the servants of the king.

Ah, Mordecai, you did not know I am

An Agagite, who fed upon the breast

Of unrelenting hate toward every child

Of Israel, who will not bend the knee

Save to the God of Abraham. Oh, do

[Wailing in Street.]

You, Zeresh, hear that wail of anguish? Love,

I know that you are proud to be the wife

Of him who can direct such music.

Zeresh

I

Am proud of Haman's power.

Haman

Go call our friends.

Zeresh

Before the rising sun had touched with gold

The treetops on the peaks of Zagros, Tesh,

The son of Zalphon, was abroad

In Shushan on the errand of my lord.

Haman

Not only in this city, but, my spouse,

In every province of the king, the Jews

In sackcloth mourn because of Haman's might.

But would you know the secret of my strength?

This ring! The seal of Xerxes. It is death

To every drop of Jacob's blood within

The Domain of Ahasuerus' rule.

Zeresh

The guests are coming.

Haman

Oh, the messages

Of enmity are swift as shafts of love.

Now, Zeresh, call the servants of the house

And set a sumptuous feast, for Haman would

Take counsel of his friends.

Zeresh

My gracious lord,

The table is already set. Go greet

The guests and bring them in.

[Exit Haman.]

[Zeresh continues.]

Parshandatha,

What do you think of Haman? Did you note

My lord?

Parshandatha

I did, madam. His happiness

Is most complete. His rapid rise to power

Has all but ravished him with joy. And yet,

Methought that something still he lacked. Perhaps

The queen's consent has not yet been obtained

To this decree that puts the Jews to death.

Zeresh

What do you mean? The queen's consent? My Lord

Has naught to do with Xerxes' wife, and why

Should he be troubled for a woman's whim?

Besides, who knows but Esther does approve

This slaughter of the Jews?

Parshandatha

Approve, madam?

She is a queen, but still a woman!

Zeresh

So

Am I, though not a queen! A woman, yes

But with no stomach for that hated race!

Parshandatha

'Tis whispered in the court that Esther is

Herself a Jew.

Zeresh

The Persian queen a Jew!

Then let her perish with her blood.

Parshandatha

But would

My lord consent to Esther's death?

Zeresh

Consent

Again! Parshandatha, why do you harp

Upon consent? Now listen to my words.

But should you e'er disclose one breath

Of what I say, you are yourself a Jew,

Nor is there any power in Persia's king

To save your life. My lord pretends to hate

The Jews. His hate is only wounded pride.

The deference of Mordecai is all

That Haman wants. He does not know the queen

Is Hebrew blood. This fact must still be kept

Concealed—concealed, that is, until the day

Of death. Oh, he shall know who Esther is—

This Israelite that banquets with my lord!

You think his rise is due to Esther's power?

Parshandatha

Madam, I do not know.

Zeresh

Not know! not know!

But what think you, Parshandatha? Of course

You do not know.

Parshandatha

Madam, he often dines

With Esther and the king. The king no doubt

Is very fond of your most gracious lord.

Zeresh

The king!

Parshandatha

Mayhap the queen also. Your lord

Is young and handsome still. The king is far

Beyond the queen in years.

Zeresh

I can

Not catch your drift.

Parshandatha

Madam, your husband has

A ready wit. The queen enjoys life.

Zeresh

Enjoys life!

And so do I, and likewise death. Now hold

Your blasted tongue. My husband sups again

To-morrow with the Jewish queen. They say

When Haman dines her majesty prepares

The banquet with her own most dainty hand!

Parshandatha, whose hand, think you, has laid

The feast of Adar?

Parshandatha

Zeresh! call you death

A feast!

Zeresh

A glorious feast on which my soul

Already feeds, and Esther shall be there!

[Re-enter Haman and Friends.]

Haman

Be seated at the table.

Citizens

Of Shushan, patriots of Persia, friends,

The servant of the king has called you here

To tell you of his triumph and to ask

Your sage advice. Two days ago the prince

And I sat down together to a feast

Within the palace walls and drank your health.

The royal cup was blushing like the spume

Of autumn clouds at sunset, when a wail

Arose in Shushan that has sore perplexed

The people. Mordecai, the haughty Jew,

Who sits beside the palace gate, refused

To bow or do me reverence, although

Admonished by the king. I was born

A humble subject in the private ranks

Of life; but now I wear the signet ring

Of Xerxes. Friends, the law that dooms the Jews

To simultaneous slaughter can not be

Revoked. Last night the queen invited me

To banquet with her lord. The necklace that

She wore of iridescent pearls was like

A rainbow over polar snows. Ah, she

Was fair to look upon! And now my cup

Was filled to overflowing—

[Zeresh shows great emotion.]

(Zeresh, are

You ill?)—when Esther begged that I would come

Again to-morrow to another feast

Her hand would lay for Haman and the king.

My wealth is multiplied beyond my ken;

The sceptre is almost within my grasp.

But all these things avail me naught, so long

As yonder hated Jew remains unbent.

A Friend

Destroy the brute at once!

Haman

Oh, that will not

Suffice. 'Tis not his death, but homage that

Must sweeten my revenge. Ah, I would see

Him groveling on the earth as Haman passed.

My rank and station must be recognized.

I sit beside the king; I am premier

Of Persia. Yet this Jewish dog is still

Unmoved!

Zeresh

Hang him where the kites will eat

His eyes!

Haman

O Zeresh, you are like the rising sun—

An inspiration in the hour of gloom.

We'll build this gallows fifty cubits high,

And then his Hebrew pride will bite the dust.

Oh, I can hear him whining like a cur,

My love, your wisdom is above the head.

A woman's heart is like an oracle

Divine. Prepare this gallows. Friends, I go

At dawn to greet the king. At night we dine

Alone with Esther, and—

[Zeresh faints.]

Why Zeresh, are

You ill again? Send for the leech. Her blood

Is over wrought with too much happiness.

[Curtain.]

ACT II

SCENE I

Place—The palace of the king. Outer room of banquet hall. Curtain back.

[Enter Meheuman, Biztha, and Smerdis.]

Meheuman

Ahafid has become most deaf of late;

Advancing age has wrought a piteous change

In him. He can not understand our king.

Smerdis

'Tis not the king but age that makes him groan.

I mean this age, the age in which we live.

[Meheuman and Biztha exeunt on the opposite side of stage, as Ahafid enters more stooped, and singing.]

Ahafid

[Sings.]

A country but no king,

An empire but no throne,

An upstart wears the signet ring,

My harp has lost its tone.

I can no longer sing great Persia's praise.

Smerdis

The trouble isn't with the harp, the country, king, nor throne;

Nor that an upstart wears the ring: Ahafid's voice is gone.

Ahafid

What say you, Smerdis?

Smerdis

Art is marvelous.

Ahafid

Even Ahasuerus once was king,

He was a despot, it is true, but still

A prince.

Smerdis

If prince, then why not still a king?

Ahafid

Eh, Smerdis?

Smerdis

[Aloud.]

More than prince and less than king.

Ahafid

Why now the sceptre, aye, almost the crown

Are worn by Haman, not of noble birth,

But lowborn, vulgar, raised by royal will

To first place in a land renowned for blood.

Smerdis

To first place in a land renowned for fools.

Ahafid

What's that?

Smerdis

This Haman is a cunning fox.

Ahafid

The exile of the virtuous Vashti was

A fatal sin.

Smerdis

She should have feasted with

The king.

Ahafid

I did not hear.

Smerdis

[Aloud.]

Old Xerxes lost

The finest houri in his harem. Oh,

The royal fool!

Ahafid

The Jewess Esther's but

A girl, as beauteous as a lustrous star,

But innocent as dawn of dew-washed day.

Smerdis

As wise as snakes and innocent as doves!

Ahafid

What, Smerdis, what? You catch my simile?

Smerdis

Ah, yes, Ahafid, yes, Aurora in

The bath pool. That was fine. Your poetry

Like wine improves with age. Go on, go on,

Let's have another picture of the dawn.

Ahafid

Her beauty made her queen, but can not save

Her life.

Smerdis

Ahasuerus will attend

To that.

Ahafid

[Not hearing.] Ahasuerus does not seem

To know a Persian law can not be changed.

Smerdis

He knows that lawyers can be bribed.

Ahafid

What's that?

Smerdis

[Louder.]

Just thinking of the lustrous stars of dawn.

Ahafid

But Mordecai believes that Esther can

Control the king, and yet may save the Jews.

Smerdis

I am more interested in fools than Jews.

Ahafid

The golden sceptre was extended when

She went into his presence yesterday.

Last night she banqueted with him but still

Refused to name the favor that she wished.

Smerdis

A bathrobe or some new stars for her crown.

Ahafid

[Not hearing.]

The king does not suspect her origin.

What will he do when he finds out the truth?

Smerdis

Since when has Xerxes cared for truth?

Ahafid

What say?

Smerdis

He'll add two extra stars to Esther's crown.

Ahafid

Beloved Vashti lives in poverty,

The victim of a lewd and brutal whim.

And now it seems that Esther's fate was sealed

When Haman wrote that every Jew must die

Because the Hebrew Mordecai refused

Obeisance to his over-bearing pride.

Smerdis

Watch Esther smash that seal.

Ahafid

I did not hear.

Smerdis

[Louder.]

Still quoting lines upon the innocence

Of lustrous stars, and dawn of dew-washed day.

Ahafid

[Singing.]

Minstrelsy shall be no more,

The poet's tongue is still;

The strings that woke to deeds of yore

No longer feel the thrill.

Smerdis

I'm glad no more we'll feel the thrill

For I, for one have had my fill.

Ahafid

Eh, Smerdis?

Smerdis

[Louder.]

Bathing in that simile.

[Exeunt Ahafid and Smerdis.]

SCENE II

[The curtain rises, disclosing Ahasuerus, Esther, Haman, and attendants at the banquet table.]

Ahasuerus

Beloved Esther, my most beauteous queen,

This banquet does surpass in excellence

Even the feast of yesterday, which you

Prepared for Haman and the king. Your hand

Grows deft with practice.

Esther

But, my lord, you are

A connoisseur, and can but speak these words

In flattery. O king, it was my heart,

And not my hand that flavored every dish

That lies before you.

Ahasuerus

Esther, now it is

Your tongue that flatters. Still, it does rejoice

Me much to hear such language from the queen.

A connoisseur, say you? Haman, can

You tell me, now, what bay or bight in all

The salted seas once held this shrimp?

[Holding up shrimp.]

Haman

[Tasting it meditatively.]

My lord,

I think it must have been the Persian Gulf.

Ahasuerus

Ha, ha, Haman, why you do not know

A wild goose from the Bird of Paradise.

This crangonoid is found nowhere except

Along the Red Sea beach not far from where

The hosts of Pharaoh were engulfed and lost.

Esther

[With suppressed emotion.]

Oh, king, your tongue is most acute. But whence,

Think you, this tinct of cinnamon that makes

The savor of the dish.

Ahasuerus

[Tasting for a long time.]

I give it up,

Unless it came from Java or Ceylon.

Esther

[Laughing, changing rapidly to deep feeling.]

My lord, it is not cinnamon at all,

But spice that grew a thousand years ago

In hills beyond the Jordon. Haman, can

You tell the flavor of the grape that fills

Your goblet?

Haman

[Flattered.]

Oh, I think it must have grown

In islands of the blue Aegean Sea.

Esther

[Turning to the king.]

My lord, it is the selfsame cup they drank

From sacred vessels at Belshazzar's feast

That night in Babylon.

Haman

What means the queen,

This wine is not that old, and yet, 'tis not

Excelled at banquets of the gods.

Ahasuerus

[Showing effect of wine.]

Nor kings.

This is a joyous night! Oh, queen, your wit

Has filled my cup with wine of happiness.

What think you, Haman, should be done to him

The king delighteth most to honor now?

Haman

Bring forth the robe, O king, your majesty

Does wear, and place it on the one your grace

Does most delight to honor. Xerxes, set

This man upon your royal horse, and place

Your majesty's own jeweled crown upon

His head, and let him be proclaimed

Throughout the public streets.

Ahasuerus

[Rises. Emphatic.]

So let it then

Be done to Mordecai, the Jew beside

The palace gate.

Haman

What words are these?

You can not mean the Jew!

Ahasuerus

[More emphatic.]

The Jew I mean.

Last night I could not sleep, and so I had

The book of records read, the chronicles,

Wherein I learned that this same Mordecai

The Jew had saved Ahasuerus' life,

When Teresh and another chamberlain

Had sought to lay the hand of violence

Upon your king. Let nothing fail of all

That you have spoken should be done to him

The king delighteth now to honor most.

And Esther, tell Ahasuerus now

Your dearest wish. On yesterday I begged

To know the favor you did most desire

And now it shall be granted unto you,

Whatever your request, even to half

My kingdom, it shall be performed.

Esther

[With hands extended toward the king.]

Have I

Found favor in your sight, O king, then let

My life be given unto me at my

Petition and my people live at my

Request! For we are sold to be destroyed—

To perish and be slain.

Ahasuerus

[Surprised and dazed.]

O where is he—

Oh, who is he, that dare presume to lay

The hand of violence upon my queen!

Esther

There stands this adversary, O my king,

The wicked Haman!

Ahasuerus

Haman! Haman! What

Can be the meaning of this speech? This man

I have advanced to be my premier?

Esther

I mean this craven whom you have advanced

To put to death with your own royal seal

The queen, as well as every other Jew

That breathes the Persian air, both young and old

Alike, the laughing child and gray-haired sire.

Ahasuerus

What! Esther, you a Jew!

Esther

[Proudly.]

I am a Jew.

A daughter of the tribe of Benjamin—

Pure Hebrew blood!

[A dramatic pause. Esther awaits the decision of the king, who for a time seems to waver, then extends his sceptre toward Esther. Harbonah, the king's high officer, appears. Haman throws himself at Esther's feet.]

Haman

[Pleading.]

Oh, queen, I do beseech

You, save me from his wrath.

Ahasuerus

[Angrily.]

Harbonah, let

This traitor, Haman, die at once.

Harbonah

My lord,

You know the scaffold that the premier built

For Mordecai?

Ahasuerus

The premier! What's that,

Harbonah? You mock your king? Let him

Be hanged upon this gallows. Call the Jew!

He holds the first place in my kingdom now.

[Exeunt Ahasuerus, Esther, Haman, Harbonah, and attendants.]

Zeresh

[Who has been concealed in a corner of the hall, advancing.]

At Esther's feet! An Aggagite! Ha, Ha!

A hater of the Jews! You hypocrite!

A lover of this queen! A paramour

Of her who boasts that she can trace her blood

An unpolluted stream a thousand years

To one who watched his humble flocks on bleak

Judean hills. A shepherd queen that rules

The Persian throne, and you, O Haman, you

That fed on venom for her race, are now,

Though premier, a cringing, craven wretch,

Begging this Jewish girl for worthless life.

"A rainbow over polar snows," ha, ha!

No doubt her grace was fair to look upon.

False-hearted queen, O royal prostitute!

It was your jeweled hand that laid this feast

But Zeresh's heart that furnished all the wine!

[Curtain.]

ACT III

SCENE I

Some time Later. Room in the Palace of Shushan.

[Enter Ahafid and Smerdis.]

Ahafid

[Singing.]

In the morning man may flourish

In the evening be cut down;

Dawn may find a hero famous,

Nightfall see him lose renown.

Smerdis

[Singing.]

In his youth Ahafid's singing

Was the pride of Persia's rule;

Now that age has come upon him,

Hear him braying like a mule.

Ahafid

Still singing like a nightingale, say you?

Smerdis

[Aloud.]

I did. [Aside] The long-eared kind that crops the grass.

Ahafid

Haman's hanged upon the scaffold that

He built for Mordecai. The Jew now wears

The signet ring that sealed his nation's life.

His nation's life? But how can he explain

The slaughter of the Persian hosts?

Smerdis

Now if he would, I think he could, and if he should,

He'd thus explain: "The hosts were slain because my brain

Was not insane. So I raised Cain, obtained the reign

Of this campaign, and still remain, though they were slain."

Ahafid

I think I must be growing deaf. You rhymed?

Smerdis

I only spoke a little joke. If I could sing, I'd say the ring,

And not the king explains the thing.

Ahafid

But does

The God of Abraham inspire revenge?

The worshippers of Moloch would have shrunk

From such a day of death. I marvel that

Queen Esther did not intervene. She rules

The king. But wherefore did I say the king?

Smerdis

I think it must have been to rhyme with ring.

Ahafid

Darius' son's a spineless debauchee.

[Sings.]

The Jew the purple robe enfolds

And eke the royal gown;

For Mordecai the sceptre holds

And Esther wears the crown.

[Exit Ahafid.]

Smerdis

Ahafid said he couldn't sing Ahasuerus' praise,

And that his harp had lost the tone it had in other days.

But though the Jews are on the throne and Xerxes maudlin full,

Ahafid once more tunes his lyre and bellows like a bull.

Look out, here comes the Jew, a cloud upon

His brow, the weight of empires on his brain.

What matters does he now revolve? I fear

The day of Adar troubles Mordecai.

We'll stand aside and hear the premier.

[Exit Smerdis.]

[Enter Mordecai meditatively, followed by Zeresh, who is unseen by him at first.]

Mordecai

The name of Haman perish from the earth!

The seed of Abraham be multiplied

Until they are as numberless as sands

Upon ocean's shore! This was my prayer,

I learned it at my mother's knee. Was I

Not justified?

Zeresh

[Disguised as a Hebrew woman.]

The Holy Scripture saith,

"Vengeance belongs to God."

Mordecai

But was I not

His instrument? Jehovah wrought through me;

His will, not mine was done.

Zeresh

And yet His will

Was yours?

Mordecai

The wicked Haman would have slain

Even the queen herself and every Jew

That lives within the hundred provinces

Of Xerxes' weak and vacillating rule.

Zeresh

Thy action was no more than self-defense?

Mordecai

Not self-defense of Mordecai alone,

But of my blood, of Esther and the sons

Of Jacob, exiled and defenseless else.

The God of Abraham may chasten, but

He keeps his promises, nor will forsake.

Rameses sat upon his haughty throne

And knew not Joseph, for my people were

Oppressed with bitter bondage and their lives

Made hard in mortar and in brick; but still

They grew in numbers and increased and waxed

Exceeding mighty, till the land was filled

With them. And then the king was sore afraid

And wroth because the Jews had never bent

The knee at Egypt's shrines. He could enslave

But not corrupt the children of the true

And living God. And then he called

The Hebrew midwives and commanded them

To slay thereafter every son that might

Be born to Jacob's sacred blood. God kept

His covenant with Abraham and raised

Up Moses, the deliverer, and when

The plagues had failed to soften Pharaoh's heart,

The Lord smote every firstborn in the land

Of Egypt, save where hyssop mixed with blood

Was sprinkled on the lintel of the door

And on the two side posts, as Moses had

Directed. Saviour of his people, son

Of Amram and of Jochebed, obscure

Levites, found in an ark of bulrushes

Afloat among the flags near by the spot

Where Pharaoh's daughter bathed, and yet, and yet—

Zeresh

Was Moses not selected by the Lord

To lead the Israelites into the Land

Of Promise?

Mordecai

[As in soliloquy.]

And did he not talk with God

Upon the Mount of Sinai, when smoke

Enveloped all the peak, and even priests

Were not allowed upon that holy ground?

Was I more lowly than was Amram's child?

Zeresh

Yet God exalted him until the throne

Of Egypt was within his grasp.

Mordecai

Though I,

Like Jesse's son, was once a shepherd's lad,

To-day I rule ten million souls.

Now Moses was a vessel of the Lord

When Death passed over every Hebrew home,

But slew the firstborn where no blood was found.

Was this revenge? Not Moses' hand, but God's

Was red.

Zeresh

The servant must obey his Lord.

Mordecai

I did not plot the Persians' death. The plan

Of God was in it all.

Zeresh

Else why were you

Made premier at the moment when the Jews

Faced death in every province of the king?

Mordecai

It was my hand that stopped the massacre,

But God avenged the awful wrong!

Zeresh

And Esther! How is it with her? You made

Her queen. She was a humble Hebrew girl,

Unknown and friendless, but for Mordecai.

Mordecai

She should be grateful for the crown I gave.

Zeresh

But Hatach says her cheeks are often wet

With tears.

Mordecai

It may be that she weeps for him

Who won her girlish heart before we came

To Shushan or had ever seen the king.

Zeresh

And yet that can not be. The shepherd's crook

Is not the golden sceptre of a king.

I have no doubt that she has long since ceased

To think of youthful dreams. She rules the king,

And what more does a woman want?

Mordecai

I did

Not hope to make her understand at once.

My reasons were too subtle for her heart.

And so I kept my counsel, for I knew

No girl would ever sacrifice her love

To save the remnant of a nation's life.

Zeresh

[Justifying.]

And why might even Esther not forget

When once she felt the spell of royal power—

The tinsel show and glamour of the court?

No woman lives that would not be a queen.

Mordecai

I knew Ahasuerus was a brute,

But what of that? Through Esther I have saved

A half a million souls.

Zeresh

[Aside.]

Through Esther you

Have slain a million souls.

Mordecai

When Jepthah vowed

A vow unto the Lord he kept his pledge

And slew the only daughter of his flesh

For a burnt offering unto God, because

The Ammonites, his enemy, had been

Delivered to the hands of Israel.

Now Esther was my only child.

Zeresh

[A little sarcastically.]

You have

Not sacrificed, but elevated her.

Although she does not understand your heart,

She can but bless her uncle Mordecai.

Mordecai

But why should Esther weep? She risked her life

At my behest, but did she not obtain

Great favor with the king?

Zeresh

And Esther's life

Was forfeit then through Haman's wicked hate.

Mordecai

I wear the royal robe of blue and white.

Zeresh

Does Esther think because her vanity

Is flattered by the jewels of a queen

That Mordecai is moved by pomp and show?

Mordecai

'Tis not the kingly trappings but the seal—

Not sceptre merely but the signet ring,

Not rank, but rule that Mordecai would have.

I can not understand her tears no more

Than she knows why I wear the crown. But I

Am justified. Jehovah wrought through me.

[Exit Mordecai.]

Zeresh

[Bursting into fury.]

Jehovah wrought through him! Hell wrought through him!

I marvel that his tongue is not consumed

By blasted lies. Wait till he feels the flame

That rages in my heart. Hell may not burn

A Jew, but even he can not withstand

The simoon of a fiery dragon's breath!

Parshandatha

But Zeresh, was the Jew not justified?

Zeresh

Justified! gratified! satisfied! Parshandatha,

Justified in Jepthah; gratified

That he is like the meek and lowly son

Of Amram; satisfied that now the crown

Of Persia presses only Hebrew brows.

Parshandatha

[Sarcastically.]

You do forget my lord, Darius' son.

You can not think the blood of Jacob flows

Through Xerxes' veins? Does he not wear the crown?

Zeresh

[With contempt.]

Ahasuerus wears a pigeon's heart.

The Persian robe's a Jewish gabardine;

The crown, a Hebrew priest's phylactery.

But did you say forget? Have you been so

Long with me, dear, and doubt my memory?

Forget Ahasuerus, did you say?

That minion of a Jewish girl, who sealed

The death of Haman and his sons? His face

Is seared upon my heart, his image burnt

Into my brain. I tell you Xerxes is

No longer king.

Parshandatha

But is not Esther queen?

Zeresh

Parshandatha, why do you taunt me thus?

Have I not proved your friend? Do I deserve

Your mockery?

Parshandatha

I do but speak to sting

You to revenge.

Zeresh

Let fly your venom then.

The Persian empire is in arms. To-night

The king does hold a great carouse. The Jew

Will sit in state beside the profligate.

This blade I have prepared against that hour.

The queen, I understand, will be a blaze

Of gems. Ahasuerus boasts this night

Would all but wreck a petty kingdom.

Parshandatha

He

Should never live to see the rising sun.

Zeresh

The rising sun! My dear, he shall not see

The Pleiades again, and they are up

At nine. When cornet and the trumpet bruit

The entry of the queen, a hundred blades

Like this [disclosing dagger] shall be unsheathed.

Parshandatha,

You know whose blood my blade shall drink!

My hour has come! Ah, Esther, you shall sup

Once more with Haman and your drunken lord,

While Zeresh keeps her lonely watch

Beneath the silent, glittering stars. Come on!

[Exeunt Zeresh and Parshandatha.]

[Curtain.]

SCENE II

Place—Outer hall to throne room, curtain back.

Time—The following evening.

[Enter Vashti and Esther from opposite sides of the stage.]

Esther

Ah, here already, Vashti, at my poor

Request, who dared defy a despot king's

Command to come before him and his lords?

Your beauty, radiant and spotless, grows

Each hour of exiled life more potent still

Than when it hurled an oriental crown,

With all its flashing jewels, in the face

Of brutal Xerxes rather than unveil

Unto a drunken court of lustful eyes.

Uncrowned, deposed, you are, yet thrice a queen!

Vashti

The sting, the sting of your envenomed words!

Esther

Forgive me, dear, I do not mock your fate;

No word of mine is spoke in scorn. I would

Exchange the royal robe and crown I wear

For just one hour of virtuous freedom that

Belongs to you.

Vashti

I can not understand!

Esther

I know; 'tis my misfortune, and I called

You to the palace that I might explain.

Yet every word seems cruel mockery.

I do not blame you that your cheek, as chaste

As lilies, blushes at my seeming shame.

Yet, Vashti, can you not believe I need

Your sympathy? I crave your high respect?

Vashti

You must an explanation.

Esther

Well, did you

Not sacrifice a queenship for the gem

That every woman holds above a throne?

How can we estimate your loss? The pomp

That follows majesty; the crooking knee;

Ten thousand minions at your beck and call;

A thousand sycophantic, fawning lords;

A hundred gleaming jeweled chandeliers;

The radiance and rich magnificence

Of court; long hours of revel and of wine;

And then above the splendor and the show

God's finger writing on the wall! Is this

The precious price that you have paid?

Vashti

This is

The price.

Esther

Sweet friend, I thank you. Yes, your loss

Has been my gain! Yet what reward have I?

How I do hate the crown that you did spurn!

O how I love the pearl of greatest price!

God pardon my great sin!

Vashti, I am

A daughter of Rebecca and the blood

Of Rachel pulses in my veins! Beyond

The northern hills, within a valley green,

A shepherd watches o'er his flocks to-night

Beside a starlit stream, and dreams of her

Who gave the promise of her hand when life

Was young and all the earth was pure and fair.

His love was constant as the northern star,

And mine was like the needle pointing true.

That day is but a sad remembrance now.

I never knew the ones who gave me life.

My uncle, Mordecai, who sits in state

Beside the king instructed me in love

And knowledge of my people. Every night,

As well as every day, like Daniel, I

Was taught to pray, my window open toward

Jerusalem. God softened Cyrus' heart

Because of Daniel's prayer. But, Vashti, you

Must know from Persian Gulf to Caspian Sea,

The sons of Jacob still in exile groan

Beneath a tyrant's yoke. I hear the wail

Of Rachel weeping for her children still;

I hear my lover playing on his flute,

Who waits the coming of a faithless bride!

But Mordecai has stayed the hand of Death!

Vashti

And you did eat your heart to save your blood?

Esther

You comprehend at last? Your sympathy,

O Vashti, I must have, if not respect,

Else can I not return unto the king.          [Vashti weeps.]

There, there, I thank you, sister, friend, proud queen!

The tears that glitter on your cheeks are worth

A diadem of sparkling Indian stones.

But weep no more—your hand—for Esther's heart

Can now endure, since Vashti understands!

The stars are twinkling in the northern skies;

They shimmer on the stream beyond the hills;

The shepherd's reed is wailing on the breeze;

The revels in the palace now begin;

The call has come; I must no longer stay.

The daughter of a Benjamite will lay

Her heart upon the altar of her blood.

Hear you the crimson riot in my veins?

'Tis Rachel's voice! I would that you could know!

·······

Forgive me, Vashti, for my brain's distraught!

The lights die out beyond the palace walls.

The stars are hid.... I can no longer hear

The wailing flute.... Return unto your hut.

Ahasuerus calls with mantling wine.

My place is yonder by the king. I go!

[Exeunt Esther and Vashti.]

[Enter Ahafid and Smerdis.]

Ahafid

The last word has been spoken

The last true song been sung;

My country's heart is broken,

The poet's harp unstrung.

Smerdis

Ahafid seems to harp upon his strings.

Ahafid

It seems Ahasuerus means to drink

The cup of revel to its bitter lees.

Smerdis

The deeper in the cup he goes

The sweeter is the wine that flows;

The closer to the lees, he thinks,

The purer is the wine he drinks.

Ahafid

Messengers from every province bring

Reports of mutterings and dangerous

Revolt. But Xerxes, heedless still, declares

This night shall dim the glories of the past.

Smerdis

[Sings.]

The lower in the lamp the oil

The fewer are the days of toil.

The brighter burns the wick of life,

The sooner end the days of strife.

'Tis not for oil that Xerxes cares,

But brilliancy of flame that flares.

Ahafid

I hate the Hebrews and their Jewish God;

I hate Jehovah for his jealous love,

But Mordecai refuses to attend

The feast. The God of Israel must save

Us now, or Persia perish utterly.

My hand will pen no ribald verse

This revel to adorn;

Ye gods, inspire my tongue to curse

The day the king was born.

[Exit Ahafid.]

Smerdis

The more he swears the less he sings,

Then welcome is this news he brings;

For listening to his song is worse

Than hearing old Ahafid curse.

[Exit Smerdis.]

[Re-enter Ahafid.]

Ahafid

[Sings.]

Persia's heart is beating low,

Thinking of the long ago,

When the king that wore the crown

Was a prince of great renown;

When her name without a peer

Did inspire the world with fear;

But to-night her sovereign's lust

Trails her banner in the dust.

Now my life is ebbing fast,

Dreaming of the glorious past;

Feeling all the shame and smart,

Dying of a broken heart.

[Sinks to floor.]

[Curtain.]

SCENE III

[Curtain rises on Ahasuerus and his court.]

Ahasuerus

Sha-ashgaz, keeper of the concubines,

Ahasuerus drinks your health

And bids you bring immediately before

The court the serpents of the Orient!

The king would have a night of revelry.

[The court fool, Smerdis, dances out before the court.]

Ahasuerus (Continues)

What, Smerdis, is the office of a fool?

Smerdis

To charm these serpents of the Orient!

[Aside] But more to furnish brains for idiot kings.

Ahasuerus

Now tell the chief musicians every one

To string his harp with golden wire and tune

His finest Persian reed to touch the heart

With joy. To-night the emperor of the East,

The monarch of the world from Babylon

To India, would show munificence

Of entertainment never seen within

The palace walls before.

Smerdis

You do forget

That night six years ago. The palace was

A blaze of light. The air was fragrant with

The breath of spice from off the Indian seas.

Ahasuerus, flushed with flattery

And wine, was mad with passion....

Ahasuerus

[Impetuously.]

Smerdis, charm

These serpents, if you will, your glittering words

Are meaningless to me. Carshena, let

The Jewish Esther come in Tyrian robe,

In such a gown as never Vashti wore!

Smerdis

[Aside.]

His orders have not always been obeyed.

Ahasuerus

And I would have my queen adorned with gems,

That diamond cluster from beyond the Ind,

Which, sparkling in her aureole of gold, bedims

The constellation of the Southern Cross.

Smerdis

[Aside.]

And makes the Persian peasants mourn their loss!

Ahasuerus

I say, Meheuman, this shall be a night

In which Ahasuerus feasts his friends—

A banquet for the soul, as well as flesh.

Smerdis

[Aside.]

A famished soul such feasting would refresh!

Ahasuerus

For who does not delight to look upon

The rhythmic beauty of voluptuous form?

Smerdis

[Aside.]

Cold-blooded heart a writhing snake can warm!

Ahasuerus

Whose ear is not enthralled by luscious lute,

Whose heart is not inspired by festive song!

Smerdis

[Aside.]

The one bowed down by tyranny and wrong!

Ahasuerus

But why has Mordecai delayed to come?

The hated sons of Haman are no more;

That reprobate who would have slain the queen

Herself to gratify his wounded pride

Has long since festered in the rain and sun.

No enemy remains alive who dares

To touch the people of the Jew that saved

The life of Persia's king. He wears my ring;

The purple of my empire is a shield

Against the world. I do not understand

Why Mordecai is late. He should be here;

The tabor and tymbrel sound anon.

Smerdis

[Dances and capers before the king, then speaks solemnly.]

O king, I know why Mordecai is late,

He sits once more beside the palace gate,

In sackcloth and bemoans his fate.

He sits and dreams of hills and streams

That flow through pasture lands and fields.

He sees a child of golden hair,

As happy as the vibrant air,

And hears the notes and pulse of song

Where birds and sheep and shepherds throng.

And then he turns to banquet halls

And scenes like this in palace walls,

Where lords and queens and fools and kings,

And concubines and underlings,

Made one with wine and passion's thrall,

Throw dice with Death, nor heed the call

That comes from Persia's bleeding heart,

[Aside] (A fool that can not play his part).

And this explains why he is late,

The Jew beside the palace gate.

Ahasuerus

You are a jester, not a bard. Your cap

And bells, or else Death wins his throw with you.

Meheuman, call the poet of the court,

The great Ahafid. Let him celebrate

This feast in song. This rhyming fool presumes

Too much upon the patience of the king.

Smerdis

Your majesty, I did but rhyme because

Ahafid's dead.

Ahasuerus

Ahafid dead? What caused

His death?

Smerdis

[Aside.]

A broken heart. [Aloud.] He broke his harp

And died of grief. [Aside again.] The good gray poet could

Remember real kings.

Ahasuerus

Of grief? The fool!

Well, let the younger minstrel, Saadi sing.

Saadi

[Sings.]

Lift the voice and let us sing,

The monarch's on his throne;

Xerxes is the greatest king

The world has ever known.

Women, wine and happy song,

Let the revels ring,

Lift your voices loud and long,

For Xerxes is our king.

[Much revel and dancing. The trumpet sounds.]

Ahasuerus

Ahafid's death was only Persia's gain.

[Meditatively.]

Could Vashti look upon this gorgeous scene

The bitter tears would scald her faded cheeks

At thoughts of her own folly.

[Confusion and much disturbance. Ahasuerus, surprised, cries in angry passion.]

Ho! What means

This rude confusion? Who has dared disturb

The king in this unwonted way?

[Enter messenger.]

Messenger

Tidings,

O king, of riot and revolt!

Ahasuerus

Restore

The court to order. I will hear no news!

There is no news but this night's joy. What fear

Need Persia have? The world is safe;

The emperor lives! Go put the messengers to death!

This is no time to cloud the royal brow!

Bring forth the vintage from the deepest vault.

Here are a hundred irised pearls. They cost

A million sesterces. Let each man crush

A lustrous shell and drink it to the health

Of Esther, beauteous queen of all the East.

Arise! She comes! A blaze of splendor. Now

Let every instrument be sounded.

The revels shall continue till the dawn!

Zeresh

[Rushing in with uplifted dagger and thrusting it into the heart of Esther, crying as she flourishes it before the astonished court.]

The dawn, O king, is breaking in the east!

[Curtain.]

FINIS

POEMS AND SONNETS

To

DOCTOR W. W. RAY

PHYSICIAN, SCIENTIST, POET, MUSICIAN

To Whom

Whether in Art or Nature

Truth is Beauty and Beauty Truth,

To Whose Appreciation and Enthusiasm I Owed my Intellectual

Awakening in Youth, and Whose Friendship and Love

have Increased That Obligation Immeasureably

as the Years have Passed,

I Dedicate these Poems

With the Affection of a Full Heart

COTTON NOE

"Then why not praise the tallow-dip, the dog irons and the crane,

The kettle singing on the coals, or hanging to a chain?"

Poems and Sonnets

THE OLD DOG IRONS

Oh, the old, old dog irons! How the picture thrills my soul,

As I stir the ashes of the past and find this living coal:

When I blow the breath of memory it flashes into flame,

That seems to me far brighter than the most undying fame.

Will you listen to the story of my early childhood days

When I read the mystic symbols in the embers and the blaze

Of the old wide-open fireplace, where the backlog, all aglow

With its shifting scenes of fancy, was a motion picture show?

I know about your natural gas, your stoves and anthracite,

Your phonograph and telephone and incandescent light;

I've heard about the comforts and the use of gasoline,

And the educative value of a Pathe photo-scene;

The future of the biplane and the wonders of the press,

And the blessings of the wireless when a ship is in distress.

I marvel at invention and its all but magic art,

But the things that make for happiness concern the human heart.

Then why not praise the tallow dip, the dog irons and the crane,

The kettle singing on the coals, or hanging to a chain?

The children gathered round the hearth to hear of early days—

The wildcat and the panther, the redman's sneaking ways;

The bravery of our fathers, the scalping knife and gun,

The courage of the women folks; I tell you, boys, 'twas fun.

We roasted sweet potatoes and we talked of Marion's men,

How they routed all the redcoats, or slew them in the fen.

We learned to love our country and we swore to tell the truth,

And do no deed of treachery and never act uncouth;

To guard the honor of our name, and shield a virtuous home,

To read the Proverbs and the Psalms and love the sacred tome.

I know our home was humble then—rag carpet on the floor—

But the stranger found a welcome there, the latch-string on the door.

The well-sweep and the woodpile and the ox team in the shed,

Dried apples hung around the walls, and pumpkins overhead—

Not sanitary, I'll admit, nor stylish-like, nor rich,

But health and comfort and content; now tell me, which is which?

Then who can blame me that I love the good old dog iron days,

When men had hearts and character that fortune couldn't faze;

The years before the slitted skirts and the Turkish cigarettes,

When women wove their linsey clothes instead of devilish nets;

When children did the chores at night, nor ever heard of gym,

Or movements such as boy scouts, yet kept in health and trim.

We spent our evenings all at home, and read and sang and played,

Or talked of work and feats of strength, or what our crops had made;

And when we mentioned quilting bees and apple-peeling time,

We had in mind our sweethearts and we sometimes made a rhyme:

'Twas then I read my future in the embers and the blaze,

And this is why I celebrate the good old dog iron ways.

THE AGE ELECTRIC

The glory of the good old days has passed from earth away,

The lumbering loom, the spinning wheel, Maud Muller raking hay;

The old rail fence, the moldboard plough, the scythe and reaping hook,

Corn shuckings, and Virginia reel, and young folks' bashful look.

Now poor old father limps behind his motorcycle son

And sees the world go whizzing by and knows his race is run.

With rheumatism in his joints and crotchets in his brain,

He finds that he can hardly catch th' accommodation train.

Two dozen bottles of the oil of Dr. Up-To-Date

Would put to flight the rheumatiz and straighten out his pate;

But fogy folks don't have the faith, nor interest in the race,

They'd rather drive a slow coach horse than go at such a pace.

Efficiency! efficiency! In business, church and school,

Where Culture in a dunce's cap sits grinning on a stool,

And wondering where the thing will end, and what the prize will be,

When Intellect, all geared and greased, is mere machinery.

Old Homer and the Iliad, the Trojan and the Greek,

The Parthenon and Phidias, not ancient, but antique.

Great Cæsar and the Gallic War and Virgil with his rhyme,

And Cicero have all gone down beneath the wheel of time.

And Dante now lies buried deep beneath the art debris,

Where Michael Angelo once wrought for immortality.

The Swan of Avon's not in school, but on the movie screen,

The Prince of Denmark can not talk but still he may be seen.

All history and literature, philosophy and truth

Would take about three evenings off of any modern youth

To master through the picture art if he the time could spare,

From vaudeville shows and joy rides and tango with the fair.

The problem is to find an hour so busy is the age,

And so important is the work and tempting is the wage.

Then what's the use of poetry or history anyhow?

Best turn your back upon the past and face the present now!

Get busy, and be on the job, the world will pay for skill.

It says: "Deliver me the goods, and then present your bill."

The family circle and the talk around the old hearth stone,

The sage advice, when backlogs glowed and grease lamps dimly shone,

Are mouldy pictures of the past, mere myths of long ago,

When grandsires had found out some things that children didn't know.

How many bushels can you raise upon your plot of ground?

How many blades of grass now grow where once just one was found?

Oh! Nature is the proper theme, but better Wordsworth drop,

San Jose scale and coddling moth will get your apple crop.

Ben Johnson and Will Shakespeare and Goldsmith all are dead.

Put nodules in alfalfa roots not dramas in your head.

Tomato canning's orthodox if done with due dispatch,

Don't let your daughter dream of fame, just show her how to patch.

The laws of sanitation soon will put the fly to flight,

Then stop tuberculosis next and win the hookworm fight.

If man could live a century it may be in the strife,

He'd learn to make a living if he didn't make a life!

What matter if the primrose is beside the river's brim,

A yellow primrose growing there and nothing more to him,

He's caught the trick of sustenance (but lost his taste for rhyme),

Though the oxen in the clover fields have had that all the time!

GRANDMOTHER DAYS

Ah, Grandmother Young was wrinkled and old

When she sat by the mantelpiece;

And she wore a cap with many a fold

Of ribbon and lace, as rich as gold,

And worked in many a crease:

And the billowy clouds of smoke that rolled

From her little stone pipe whenever she told

Of the quest of the Golden Fleece,

Wrought me to think that Grandmother Young

Was shriveled and gray when Homer sung

Of the gods of ancient Greece.

But all of her marvelous mythical lore

Was naught to her magical power—

Transforming a house with a puncheon floor

To a palace of wealth with a golden door

That lead to a castle tower—

An attic loft with a wonderful store

Of things that we feared, but longed to explore—

Our grandmother's ancient dower.

Oh, grandmother's charm could change but a base

Rude vessel of clay to a Haviland vase,

A weed to a royal flower.

Ah, grandmother's home was a temple of grace

And my child-heart worshipped there,

When Balm-of-Gilead around the place,

Like incense, for a mile of space,

Perfumed the glorious air;

And the song that came from the feathered race

In the boughs of the tangled interlace

Of apple and peach and pear,

Enthralled me like the magic spell

Of siren music when it fell

On old Ulysses' ear.

Last summer I passed where the palace once stood

Whose beauty my life beguiled;

It's a cabin now; and the charmed wood

Of sugar and oak, in brotherhood

Of walnut and hickory, aisled

For gathering nuts and the merry mood

That only our childhood understood,

By man has been defiled.

Oh, how can I ever cease to praise

The fairy enchantment of grandmother days

When I was a little child!

JUST TO DREAM

Just to dream when sapphire skies

Are as blue as maidens' eyes;

Just to dream when petals sow

All the earth with pink and snow;

Just to sit by youth's bright stream,

Gazing at its crystal gleam—

Listening to the wren and dove—

Hearing only songs of love—

Just to dream.

Just to dream of sabre's flash

When the lines of battle clash;

See the army put to rout—

Hear the world's triumphant shout;

Just to dream our name supreme—

Hero of a poet's theme,

First among the sons of men,

Master of the sword or pen—

Just to dream.

Just to dream when skies grow gray,

Just to dream the days away—

Living over childhood's joys,

Sorrow that no longer cloys;

Just to muse of days that seem

Like the sunlight's golden beam,

Summer nights and winter's snow.

Just to dream of long ago—

Just to dream.

AMNEMON

"Dear, the struggle has been hard and long—

The wine-press I have trodden,

Paved with flint and shard;

And many times my feet have stained

The flagstones of the street with blood.

Out yonder in the park where life's rich chalice

Sparkles with the wine of happiness and love

The world was always dull and dark to me.

Hours I have stood upon the beach

And watched the whitecaps glinting

In the sunlight and listened to the breakers

Booming on the sinuous shore,

While little children clapped their hands

And shouted out across the waters,

And gray-haired men and women shook their heads

In silence and looked toward the sunset.

But everything was always meaningless to me.

Season after season I have watched the butterflies

By millions come and go

And katydids each year have sung

The song monotonous and passed away.

Yesterday the sun arose upon another world.

Gray skies have turned to brilliant blue;

The droning hum of beetles on the breeze

Is like an orchestra of lovely music.

The air is sweet and fresh as dewdrops in convolvuli.

For two bright hours I have strolled

Among the flowering shrubbery near the seashore,

Listening to a song I had not heard for years.

And now once more that I am happy,

May I not confess it all?

I did you wrong, great wrong.

There was no stain upon my life,

No taint of blood within my veins.

I came of Pilgrim stock, vigorous and strong.

I did not understand my heart,

And knowing all the stress you placed upon heredity,

I told a falsehood, partly as a test of love,

And part for self-protection.

I have suffered much, but justly.

You said my story broke your heart,

And left me where I stood,

Pondering on the sin I had committed.

I had proved your love, but all too late.

Your talent meant a brilliant future,

And I knew your great ambition.

For years I scanned the periodicals

Where names of most renown in literature are found,

Expecting always to see my lover's there,

But always doomed to disappointment.

And yet I now rejoice

That you have not achieved great fame,

For otherwise I could not write this letter.

Perhaps 'twere best that I should never send it;

If so, it will not find its way to you.

It may be that you think me dead,

Or worse—I may have been forgotten.

This is April twenty-first;

The hillsides now are pink with peach and apple bloom.

I will arrive in Salt Lake City, May the third,

And be at Hotel Utah.

If your heart, through all these years,

Like mine, has hungered, you will be there too.

Geraldine."

Alfred Milner read this letter

While great drops of perspiration

Stood upon his brow and trembling hand.

For seven winters he had tried

To bury in oblivion a face and form

That always with the dogwood blossoms

Came again, and each time seemed more fair.

He had tried for fame and failed.

But now his book that bore a pen name only

Was selling daily by the thousands

And fame and fortune, latter-day twin saints,

Were building him a shrine.

But did she know of his success,

And was her conduct

Years before base cowardice?

Had she only told the cruel tale

Because she knew his theory of insane blood,

And hid her lack of faith

By taking refuge in his prejudice?

Or was her story true?

If true or false, why had she kept it back

Until she knew red passion

Was a-riot in his heart?

He tore the letter into strips

And blew them fiercely through the air.

He had suffered much himself,

But she was not concerned.

What if this letter had been sent

To open healing wounds,

To win some wager with another man

To whom she boasted of her power?

He would not go!

The air was growing foul and stuffy

In his suite of rooms,

And Alfred threw the window open.

The subway in the distance

Rumbled like a gathering storm;

The palisades across the Hudson

Now were darkling in the falling shadows.

April thirtieth at noon.

The Rocky Mountains looked like towers

On the Chinese Wall a hundred miles away.

Would he make connection at Pueblo?

The gray monotony of grass and cacti

Had begun to wear upon his nerves.

He longed to see the Royal Gorge—

The steep and jagged heights of hills.

They spoke of giant strength

He needed for the coming struggle.

It might be that the air

From off eternal snows

Would cool the fever in his brain.

"May second, and yonder lies the Great Salt Lake,

Or else a mirage on the desert's rim."

Alfred put his pen upon the register

Of Hotel Utah,

And read the list of names above.

She was there, "Geraldine Mahaffy."

Finally he scrawled a signature,

But wrote his nom de plume.

The clerk thrust out his hand and beamed.

Two porters swooped upon his grips,

And soon the lobby hummed.

But Alfred Milner sat alone within his room

Battling with emotions he could neither

Overcome nor understand.

He did not know the stir his name upon the register

Had made below, or knew what name he wrote.

At last: "Geraldine Mahaffy:

This is May the third and I am here."

Thoughtfully he creased the sheet

And rang: "Room ten, and answer, please."

The smell of brine was heavy on the air

That blew across the lake.

The mountains to the north were white with snow above

And dogwood petals on the southern slopes.

But winter was forgotten in the plains,

For rivulets imprisoned long in cataracts

Were leaping over waterfalls

And shouting like a red bird,

In an April cedar tree.

Milner drew a long deep breath of spring

And walked into the parlor.

"Alfred!"

"Geraldine!"

"Last night I dreamed of Cornell days,

And saw the redbuds blooming in the hills

Behind the cliffs of Ithaca!"

"The ice in Cascadilla Creek is gone.

All night I heard the roaring of the falls!"

"The call of flickers sounded through the canyons

Of Old Buttermilk, and peckerwoods were beating

Reveilles before the sun was up!"

"Two blue birds built a mansion

In a dead oak trunk

And called the world to witness!"

"Alfred!"

"Geraldine!"

"The train for California leaves at nine!"

Some hours out from Great Salt Lake,

The sand dunes stretching southward

O'er a waste of shrubbery and alkali

Were shimmering in the sunshine

Like copper kettles on a field of bronze.

"Dear Alfred, can you still recall

Those afternoons upon the cliffs above Cayuga Lake?

The little city, Ithaca,

Was like a jewel on the breast of Nature.

The lake a band of silver, stretching northward.

A hundred waterfalls were visible

From where we used to sit.

We often thought the lime-washed houses

Far to west, resembled whited decks

Upon a sea of emerald;

And wondered if our own good ship

Would one day cast its anchor in the harbor.

Over to the right the Cornell towers,

Like mediæval castles beetling o'er the precipice,

Were keeping silent watch above it all.

The memory of those blessed days alone

Has kept my heart alive."

"But Geraldine, our vessel richly laden

Has at last come in

Nor ever will put out to sea again.

Happy as those moments were,

Forget the past, so fraught with bitterness to me."

The desert now a hundred miles behind

Was fading like a crescent sea beach

In the setting sun.

Slowly like a giant serpent

The Sunset Limited climbed the great Sierras

And started down the western slope at dawn.

The valley of the Sacramento

Never bloomed so beautiful before.

The blue Pacific through the haze

Was like a canvas sea.

Peace permeated all the earth.

The sun at last was resting on the ocean's rim.

The turquoise waters turned to liquid gold.

"Life, O my beloved, is like eternal seas—

Emerald in the morning, changing into opal,

Amethyst and pearl, but ruby red at last.

Behold the Golden Gate!

The seas beyond are all like that!"

Morning in the Sacramento!

Petals, dew and fragrance—indescribable!

Plumage, song and sunshine,

And over all a California sky!

"O Alfred, could it only be like this forever!

Back yonder in New York,

The world is built of brick and mortar,

And men forget the handiwork of God.

How can a poet hope to win a name

Where men are mad for gold?"

"A name! Why Geraldine! I had forgot

To tell the story of my fame.

The ecstacy of these three days

Had blotted all earthly fortune from my memory.

I am Ralph Nixon, author of the Topaz Mystery."

"Ralph Nixon! You! Then who am I?"

A heavy tide of blood swept over

All the tracery of the bitter past,

And in a moment more

She lay unconscious on a bed of thorny cactus.

The City Argentina blew a long loud blast

And anchored in the bay.

The woman opened wondering eyes

And looked at Milner.

"Why do you call me Geraldine?

My Christian name's Amnemon.

We never met before.

I am Major Erskine's wife.

We live in Pasadena.

I do not know your name or face,

Nor how I came to be with you.

I never saw this place before,

But those are California hills

And yonder is the great Pacific.

The mystery of who you are,

And where I am, I can not solve.

I only know I wish to see my home and child;

Little Alfred never has been left alone,

And may be calling for his mother now.

You seem to be a gentleman.

Please show me to the nearest train

That goes to Pasadena."

Half in fright and half in rage

Milner looked at Geraldine and tried to speak.

The mountains reeled and pitched into the sea.

A clevage in the brain! But whose?

This was insanity, but whether his

Or hers he was unable to decide.

The memory of the Cornell days came back—

The cliffs above the lake, the emerald farms,

The gorges and the waterfalls,

And finally the wild, weird light

That played in iridescent eyes

That last day on the hills—

The story of the tainted blood and what it meant

For future generations.

Milner saw an eagle soaring high above the park

And then he heard a scream

As though a ball had pierced its heart.

The bird careened and dropped a hundred feet,

Then spreading broad its wings again,

Shot upward to the heights.

The train for Pasadena speeded onward

Toward its destination.

A poet sat within his room

That opened on the Golden Gate

And as the sun dropped into the wave,

He wrote a Requiem to Hope,

That filled the earth with fame.

A ROMANCE OF THE CUMBERLAND

Early in the day they passed the pinnacle,

And now the shadow of each human form

Was lengthening backwards like Lombardy poplars

Fallen toward the east.

For days the fairest maiden of the caravan

Had fevered—whether from malaria and fatigue,

Or more because of one whom they had left behind,

Beyond the wooded mountains,

Neither sire nor matron could agree.

But Martha Waters, as they laid her stretcher down

And prepared the camp for coming night,

Declared unless they rested here for days to come,

Her bones must bleach beside the trail

That led into the Dark and Bloody Ground.

And so they waited for the fever to abate,

But when they thought her strong enough,

A score of hardy pioneers trudged down

The slope and launched canoes and dug-outs

And a flatboat in the turgid waters

Of the Cumberland, for heavy rains had fallen

And all the mountain streams were swollen

In these early days of June.

But the air was sweet with the odor

Of wild honeysuckle and the ivy

With its starry clusters fringed

The milky way of elder bloom

That filled each sheltered cove

Like constellations on a summer night.

But now the rains had ceased, the air

Was fresh and bracing, and each glorious day

Out-rivaled all the rest in beauty.

Lying on her pallet on the flatboat,

The maiden breathed the fragrant atmosphere,

And drank refreshing whiffs of air

That drove the fever from her blood

And wakened dreams of conquest

In the wilderness toward which

Her life was drifting rapidly.

But how could she find heart for conquest?

Why seek this new land anyway, where only

And forever to card the wool and spin the flax

Would be the woman's portion?

Would ever in the forest or beyond it

In the rolling bluegrass,

Return the vision that was hers,

When only a few brief months ago

She watched the sea gulls battling with the storm

Above the waves of Chesapeake Bay?

Oh, how that day was filled with meaning

For her now! For as the birds disported

With the whirlpools of the air,

A lover's magic words were whispered in her ear,

How that storm and stress of life to those that love

Are little more than winds to swallows of the sea.

But now, if hardship meant so little,

Why had he remained behind, when she

Was forced to go upon the long and weary journey?

Ah! Could it be he cared no longer for her love?

His arm was strong. Then was his heart

Not brave enough to conquer this new world,

Where savage lurked and wild beast made

The darkness dreaded by the most courageous soul?

For days the fleet had drifted down the river,

But now her boat was anchored to a tree

That grew upon an island in the Cumberland,

And every man and woman but the convalescent

Had gone ashore to stalk a deer or gather berries

That everywhere were found along the river bank.

But Martha Waters lay upon her bed and pondered—

Dreaming day dreams, as she watched

A golden oriole who fed her young

In boughs that overhung the water,

And a vague unhappiness arose

Within her heart, until she tossed

Again in fever on her couch.

She could hear the roaring falls

A mile below, but she thought the sounding

Cataract the sickness booming in her ears again.

When she looked to eastward where the mountain

Rose a thousand feet, she saw a crown of wealth

Upon its crest of which no pioneer yet had dreamed.

Long she lay and marveled at its beauty,

Wondering how many ages would elapse before

The god of Mammon would transport its treasures

To his marts beside the sea.

Feverish she mused and pondered until at last she slept.

And then upon the little island,

A city rose as from the ocean wave—

A city of a thousand streets, and every house

Was made from trees that grew upon the mountain.

Many were the palaces of wealth and beauty,

But those who dwelt therein she did not recognize.

Strange were their faces and their manners haughty,

And while they lived in luxury and ease,

Others toiled at mill and furnace. Oh! The awful din

Of sledge and hammer, beating in her ears.

She woke. A storm seemed just about to burst in fury,

So loud and terrible was the roaring!

But the sky was clear. It is the booming

Of the falls, for her boat has broke its moorings,

And now is rapidly drifting toward the cataract,

But four hundred yards away!

She leaped upon her feet and screamed for help.

It was impossible for her to swim ashore,

And her fever-wasted frame could find no strength

With which to steer the boat.

Again she saw the crown of wealth

Upon the mountain top, untouched by human hands.

But the island city now had faded from her vision,

The mountain lowered and the world grew dark.

Onward the boat shot faster toward the roaring falls.

But look! A race is on! A birch canoe,

Driven by as swift a hand as ever gripped

An oar, is leaping o'er the waves in mad pursuit.

With every stroke the Indian bark is gaining twenty feet.

Will it reach the flatboat soon enough to save the girl?

But who is he that rides the fleet canoe?

No red man ever had an arm like that,

For already he has reached the speeding raft,

And with gigantic strength he steers it toward the shore.

But no! The current is too swift!

A moment more and all will be engulfed within

The swirling flood. It is too late! Too late?

But love is swifter than the angry tide,

For like a mighty porpoise, wallowing in the wave,

The valiant hero leaps into the stream,

And holding Martha Waters in his strong right arm

High above the water, reaches shore

A hundred feet above the deadly precipice.

The air was growing chilly even on this summer night,

And the emigrants had gathered round a crackling fire,

Discoursing of the past, and listening to a modest tale of love.

Simply and unfaltering James Hunt related

How his heart had hungered back beside the old Potomac,

Till he found he could no longer brook the passion

That grew stronger as the days of summer lengthened.

At last he started, and following every night

The blazing dogstar, and resting through the day till evening,

In just three weeks he reached the river

Where he found the birch canoe that rode

The seething waters like a greyhound of the ocean.

Then the maiden told her vision of the island city,

How its palaces and mansions, rich as gold and beautiful as crystal,

Were constructed by her people, toiling hundreds,

Sore and weary, of times cold and hungry.

She had seen them fell the forests,

Hew and mill and dress the lumber,

Till the soil and reap the harvests, gathering into others' garners.

Stalwart were these men and women, pure of heart

And strong of muscle, fitted for the tasks before them.

She had seen her brothers laboring at the forge and sounding anvil;

Sisters toiling at the wheel and distaff, heard them at the loom

While flying shuttle threaded warp with web of beauty;

Watched them till they fell asleep with weariness,

While the sons of leisure feasted.

Thus the maiden told her story, saying:

"Shall we undertake the journey? Plows are waiting

In the furrows back in Maryland, my people,

Back beyond the rugged mountain. There are harvests

Yet ungarnered, waiting for scythe and sickle.

Calculate the cost, and weigh it, for my vision is prophetic.

For my part, I choose this lover, for my guide and valiant leader.

He shall point the way forever,

Though he take the road that's darkest."

Then James Hunt, the hero lover,

Who had never quailed at danger,

Trembling for his happy passion,

Rose and pointed toward the westward,

Toward the Pleiades descending,

Deep behind the gloomy forest.

"Let us face toward dark Kentucky, fell its forests,

Build its roads and bridge its rivers,

Give our children to the nation.

What though others reap our harvests,

Hoard the wealth we have created?

Ours shall be the nobler portion.

Blessed is the one that suffers,

If he spends himself for others.

Should the toiling millions falter,

Though they work for others' comfort,

Building homes they can not enter?

Christ was born within a manger,

May we not produce a leader,

Who shall save our nation's honor?

At to-morrow morning's dawning,

Ere the sunrise gild the treetops,

Let us take the darkling pathway."

Still the Pleiades are circling,

Still the dogstar glows in heaven,

But the oak and pine and poplar

All have gone from off the mountain—

Passed into the marts of Mammon,

By the hands of toil and labor.

Silent are the loom and distaff,

In the cabin and the cottage,

And the songs of scythe and sickle

Gathering in the golden harvests.

But the pain of drudgery lingers,

And the heart still longs and hungers

For the fruitage it shall gather,

Yet beyond the wooded westward.

MORNING GLORIES.

A roguish laugh, a rustling vine,

I turn my eager eye;

Big drops of dew in bells of blue

And red convolvuli.

But nothing more; I hold my breath

And strain my eager eye;

A yellow crown, two eyes of brown,

And pink convolvuli!

The golden curls, the elfish laugh,

Rose cheeks and glittering eye

Are glories, too, like bells of blue

And red convolvuli.

CHRISTMASTIDE

Evergreen and tinsel'd toys,

Drums and dolls, and bursting joys—

Blessed little girls and boys!

Holly, bells, and mistletoe,

Tinkling sledges, here we go—

Youth and maiden o'er the snow.

Chilling winds and leaden days,

Vesper songs and hymns of praise

Silver hair and dying blaze!

Christmas morn and yuletide eve,

Dear Lord, help us to believe—

Naught but blessings we receive.

KINSHIP

Oh, little children, ye who watch the trains go by,

With yearning faces pressed against the window panes,

You do not know the reason why

Your lingering image dims my eye

Though I have passed beyond the hills into the rolling plains.

Dear little children, I once watched the trains go by,

And hungered, much as when I feel the silent stars;

And then I saw the cold gray skies,

And felt the warm tears in my eyes,

When far beyond the distant hills I heard the rumbling cars.

PRECOCITY

"Oh, grandfather, what are the stars?

Stones on the hand of God?

I heard you call that red one Mars

And those three Aaron's rod;

And these are great Orion's band!"

"My child, you are too young to understand!"

"Oh, grandfather, what are the winds

That sough and moan and sigh?

Does God grow angry for men's sins

He lifts the waves so high?

And blows his breath o'er sea and land?"

"My boy, you are too young to understand!"

"Oh, grandfather, what are the clouds

In yonder sunset sky?

They look to me like winding shrouds

For men about to die!

Dear grandfather, your trembling hand!"

"My son, you are too young to understand!"

THE SECRET

Old Santa Claus came with his pack

On his back

Right down the chimney flue;

His long flowing beard was ghostlike and weird

But his cheeks had a ruddy hue;

And his jacket was as red as a woodpecker's head

But his breeches, I think, were blue.

I heard a soft step like a hoof

On the roof,

And I closed my outside eye;

Then played-like I slept, but the other eye kept

A watch on the jolly old guy;

And I caught him in the act with his bundles all unpacked,

But I'm not going to tell, not I.

When Santa comes again this year

With his deer

And a sled full of toys for me,

I don't mean to keep either eye from its sleep

While he climbs my Christmas tree;

For I don't think it's right to the happy old wight

To spy on his mystery.

A RHYMELESS SONNET

Sardonic Death, clothed in a scarlet shroud,

Salutes his minions on the crumbling thrones

Of Tyranny, and with malicious leer,

He points a fleshless finger toward the fields

Of Belgium: "No harvest since the days

Of Bonaparte and Waterloo hath filled

My flagons with a wine of such a taste;

Your crowns ye hold by rights divine indeed!"

But One has entered in at lowly doors

And sits by every hearthstone where they will:

"My Word enthron-ed in Democracy

Has twined the holly round Columbia's brow—

A crown of 'Peace on earth, good will to men.'

I am the Resurrection and the Life!"

AMBITION

I covet not the warrior's flashing steel

That drives the dreaded foe to headlong flight;

I envy not the czar his ruthless might

That grinds a state beneath an iron heel;

I do not ask that I may ever feel

The thrill that follows fame's uncertain light;

And in the game of life I do not quite

Expect always to hold a winning deal.

Grant me the power to help my fellow man

To bear some ill that he may not deserve;

Give me the heart that I may never swerve,

In scorn of Death, to do what good I can;

But most of all let me but light the fires

Upon the altar of the youth's desires.

OPPORTUNITY

I often met her in the days of youth

Along the highway where the world goes by;

And sometimes when I caught her wistful eye

I wondered that it seemed so filled with ruth.

She was a modest maiden, plain, in truth,

And unattractive, and I thought, "Now why

Should one seek her companionship; not I—

At least, until I've had my fling, forsooth!"

And so I passed her by and had my day,

And met a thousand whom I thought more fair

In tinsel gowns beneath electric glare—

A thousand, but they went their primrose way.

Now she's a queen, and boasts a score of sons—

Her consort he who shunned my charming ones!

HOLIDAY THOUGHTS

The night was like some monster omen ill,

Whose shrieking froze the marrow of my bones;

But day dawned calm, though white as polar zones,

The bluebird shouting "Spring!" from every hill.

The world lay parching in the noonday grill,

And blades of corn were twisting into cones;

But night brought rain, and now, like golden thrones,

The fruited shocks deride October's chill.

Dear Lord, I would that we might live by faith,

However cold and dark the day may seem,

And trust that every cloud is just a wraith,

And every shadow but a fading dream.

Oh, grant our eyes may see the beacon lights

That blaze forever on the peaks and heights!

THE OLD YEAR AND THE NEW

Good-bye, Old Year; our journey has been brief;

I'm sorry now to leave thee dying here,

For thou hast borne my burdens with good cheer,

And never murmured, but assuaged my grief.

When buds of promise never came to leaf;

When broken resolutions, doubt, and fear

Did mock at my defeat, O good Gray Year,

Thy reassuring smile restored belief.

Good-bye—farewell! I trust thy dear young child,

Who greets me at the gateway of the dawn,

Will deal as gently with me and my friends,

And lead our footsteps through the springtime mild,

O'er summer's lawn, down autumn's slopes, and on

To where the path of chill December ends.

FELLOW TRAVELERS

Old comrade, must we separate to-day?

Sometimes my feet have faltered, sore and tired,

And sometimes in the sloughs and quicksands mired,

But it has always helped to hear you say,

"The road is fine a little further on."

Your optimism and your hearty cheer

Have made the journey pleasant, good Old Year,

And I, in truth, regret to see you gone.

Young New Year whom you leave me as a guide,

In doubt, would have me pledge a lot of things

Before we start, and make some offerings

To gods whose love, I fear, will not abide.

And yet I like my new companion's face.

Old Year, lend him your wisdom and your grace.

JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY

Beloved Poet, thou hast taught our heart

A sympathy it hardly knew before—

A yearning kinship and a spirit lore

Of humble folk, a love transcending art!

The pulse of brotherhood throbs in thy song.

No mystic, blindly groping on the shore

Of dark uncertainty; unlike Tagore,

Thy faith is pure and definite and strong.

Consumpted Jim and thriftless Coon-dog Wess,

The Girly Girl with eyes of limpid blue,

The Raggedy Man that Orphant Annie knew;

The Little Cripple, glad, though motherless;

Poor hare-lip Joney and the Wandering Jew—

All these thy pen doth glorify and bless!

CALE YOUNG RICE

He loves the boom of breakers on the shore,

And winds that lash the billows into foam;

He loves the placid seas beneath the dome

Of blue infinitudes—not less, but more;

He loves to brood upon the mystic lore

Of silent stars above the silent seas,

And feel the passion of infinities

Beyond, where only Faith would dare explore.

Thus groping after God has helped him find

Divinity in man (where only sin

And brutal lusts have seemed to hedge him in),

And taught his heart that Fate is never blind.

That somehow, somewhere, now beyond our ken,

One day we'll understand the wrongs of men.

PILATE'S MONOLOGUE

[This monologue of Pilate to Herod takes place a few days after the resurrection at the home of Pontius Pilate. Pilate and Herod are standing on the east porch of the Governor's mansion in Jerusalem, looking toward the Mount of Olives. The time is just at sunset.]

Oh! Herod, couldst thou find no fault in Him—

The Man of Galilee? Clearly He

Belonged within thy jurisdiction. Didst

Thou fear to do thy duty? Still I blame

Thee not—the mob was clamorous for blood!

I questioned Him, but like a lamb before

His shearers He was dumb and answered me

No word. Was not His silence proof of guilt?

But even then I offered to release

Him, till the rabble shouted, "Crucify

This Man: set free Barabbas, if thou wilt,

But we demand the life of Jesus whom

They call the Christ." Oh! dost thou think His blood

Can be upon my head? I washed my hands

Before the multitude and told them I

Was innocent of any crime toward Him.

I scourged Him, it is true, but that was all.

They stripped Him and bedecked Him with a robe

Of scarlet cloth, and placed a crown of thorns

Upon His head, and then they mocked and jeered

And spat upon Him, hailing Him as King!

I can not think that this was right, but still

They say He blasphemed and deserved to die.

But what Is blasphemy?

Oh, Herod, I

Can never rid my dreams of Jesus' look.

He turned His eyes upon me as I dipped

My fingers in the bowl—a glance that seemed

More fraught with love and pity than with hate.

He blessed the people as He hung upon

The cross in agony of pain, and prayed

His God to pardon them because they knew

Not what they did. Thou canst not, Herod, think

This Nazarene was more than man? It can't

Be possible that He whom Pilate scourged

Was Christ indeed! But could a man forgive

His murderers? They say the tomb is burst

And that His body is no longer there!

I might endure His curse. My pen has stabbed

To death a thousand men and never felt

Compunction for the deed, because I knew

They hated me. But now the voice that haunts

My sleep asks only blessings on my head.

They say He wept for men because of sin,

And yet no guile was found in Him. If I

Could close my eyes and see that face no more

I might find peace again.

Three nights I have

Not slept. I hear that Judas hanged himself!

And now no guard that watched before

The sepulchre can anywhere be found.

Had I but set the Galilean free!

But did he not insult my majesty?

He must have known I ruled in Cæsar's stead.

What if my wife was troubled in a dream

And suffered many things on His account?

A Roman governor must be a man!

They say the temple's veil was rent in twain—

The sky was darkened and the sun was hid.

He said I had no power to crucify

Except that it be given from above.

He did not know the strength of Pilate's arm!

'Tis said He cried, "My God, my God, why hast

Thou now forsaken me?" The earth did quake,

The tombs were cracked, and then the shrouded dead

Stalked ghost-like through the fields and open streets!

Look! Look! What is yon robe of shining white?

Behold the Man—the Man of Galilee!

With outstretched arms He stands on Olivet,

The shadows purpling o'er Gethsemane.

I hear Him cry in agony of soul,

"How often would I, O Jerusalem,

Have gathered unto Me thy children as

A hen her brood beneath her wing, but ye

Would not come." Herod, canst thou hear His voice?

It is impossible! It can not be!

He must not know that I am Pilate! Still

He calls my name! I can not, dare not go!

What would the people think? I will

Be free. There is no blood upon my hands.

See, I wash them clean and am myself

Again. Oh! Now the spell is gone. Though not

The king, I am governor of the Jews!

THE VIRILE SPIRIT

[Written after reading a letter in which the writer said: "I covet for our country a great war—one that will stir our virile spirits and send forth our youth to fight and die for our country."]

What is courage? To face the bursting shell

When rhythmic sheets of fire discover gulfs

Of death, yet rather steel than daunt the heart;

When comrades fall beneath the knapsack's weight,

Foot froze and bleeding on the icy road,

To hear the blasts from towering snow-crowned Alps

Sing only martial airs that stir the blood!

It is a noble thing to die in war—

To sacrifice the breath of life; to feel

The pain of hunger and of cold, yet flinch

Not that one's country may be great or free.

Many a generation yet unborn

Will bless the name of Valley Forge, and hold

In reverence the field of Gettysburg.

But war is not the only thing that tries

The bravest soul. To live does sometimes take

More courage than to close with death; and oft

The coward shrinks from living when the brave

Man scorns to die. We need no bugle note

To rouse our manhood's strength. The call to men

Is clear and strong. It is not to repel

The Hun, the Teuton, or the Slav, nor yet

To drive the Yellow Peril from the seas.

We must send forth our men to live, not die—

We need to save, not kill our fellow man,

To smite the Minotaur of Sin, and stop

The tribute greater now than all the tolls

Of war. The beast in man is ravenous

And must be slain. He feeds upon the fruits

Of toil, and blights the home with poverty;

He drags the innocent to dens of shame

To satisfy his brute carnality.

No fiery dragon in the days of myth

Laid waste a land or blasted life with breath

More foul or appetite insatiate.

This is the enemy that we must fight.

No dreadnaughts now afloat, no submarines,

No legions that may ever bivouac on

Our shores, no Zeppelins disgorging fire

Portend the dire disasters wrought upon

Our nation's strength by Avarice and Lust.

The sword of Theseus is too dull a blade,

The arm of Beowulf not strong enough

To battle with Cupidity and Sin.

We need the breastplate of a righteous life,

Our loins must be girt about with truth,

The heart protected by the shield of faith,

And in the right hand there must ever be

The spirit's sword, which is the Word of God!

And even clothed and weaponed thus it takes

A heart as fearless as the dauntless Dane's

To strike the Mammon of Unrighteousness—

To grapple with this Grendel that invades

The mead-halls still and ravishes our youth.

BLUEBIRD.

Bluebird in the cedar bush—

Fresh and clean as the evergreen,

Through a rift of leaves,

Or my eye deceives.

But silent! Hush!

He calls, he calls!

The first spring note

From a feathered throat

My heart enthralls;

And my pulses leap

As a child from sleep

On Christmas morn, at the blast of horn,

To meet, to greet,

The choral sweet

From bluebird in the cedar bush:

At last, at last

The snow and sleet

Of winter's blast

Have passed, have passed,

And spring is here, good cheer, good cheer!

The call comes ringing in to me

From Bluebird in the cedar tree.

AN AUTUMN MINOR

Russet and amber and gold,

Crimson and yellow and green,

And far away the blue and gray,

A twinkling silver sheen.

Violet, scarlet and red,

Purple and dark maroon,

And over it all the music of fall—

A weird prismatic tune.

An opera serious and grand,

An orchestra mystic and sad—

A symphony alone of color and tone

To drive a mortal mad.

SLABS AND OBELISK

Hollyhocks were blooming in the backyard near the barn,

Proud as rhododendrons by a regal mountain tarn,

Purple, white and yellow, blue and velvet red—

Humble little cottage, but a royal flower bed.

Pink and crimson roses and carnations took your breath—

Dark-eyed little pansies looking like the Head of Death;

Golden-rayed sunflowers, lifting discs of hazel brown,

Filled the heart with wonder and the garden with renown.

Little Harold, born a poet, watched the petals blow,

Read the mystic cryptographs his elders didn't know;

Heard the music in the wind like sirens on the shore,

Far beyond the sunset in the land Forevermore.

Oft the village sages saw him lying in the shade,

Gazing where the sun and vapor wrought a strange brocade—

Tapestries of gold and silver on a field of blue,

Heard him murmur softly riddles no one ever knew.

All the people pitied Harold, thinking of the end

In the cold, unfeeling world he couldn't comprehend—

Seeing nothing else but lilies, living in a trance,

In an age of facts and figures, dreaming wild romance.

But the sages now are sleeping on the little hill,

Modest slabs are keeping watch with rue and daffodil.

Harold has an obelisk that towers toward the sky,

Hollyhocks upon his mound to bless and glorify.

ON BROADWAY

Even as to-night on Broadway

Long ago I wandered down

The Great White Way of childhood,

Mystified, enchanted, as I watched

The million butterflies

That tilted through the air in rhythmic flight,

And pulsed above the petaled sweets,

And sipped the nectar of the purple thistle bloom,

Until at last they staggered down the dusty Road to Death.

POSTSCRIPT

Postscript

AN EMBER ETCHING

An old man sat before his great log fire

And gazed dreamily into the dying blaze.

His eyes were red as though with weeping.

The long, thin locks of hair

Were spotless as the snow

Silently mantling the earth

That last sad night of the dying year.

Four days and nights

He had sat beside the bed

Of his life-companion.

But now the watchers by the bier

In the adjoining room,

Were dozing in their chairs.

The cold night

Had driven the mice from their hiding,

And the loud tick of the clock

No longer frightened them

As they scampered over the hearth.

The man was breathing heavily,

Although his eyes were open,

And his stare fixed upon the fire:

Down by a gnarled oak near the spring

Two children played.

Rebecca had dipped a dock leaf

In the water,

And now whisked it in the sunlight.

Against the trunk of the tree

There was a playhouse made of broken boughs.

The girl's dolls were lying on the green moss bed,

And a little cracked slate lay upon the ground.

An almost illegible scrawl was written on the slate.

Two childish hands had traced their names:

"Rupert—Rebecca."

And the words were linked together by lines

That looked like twisted ropes.

The boy and girl sat down before the playhouse,

And crossed their hands in imitation

Of the lines that bound their names together.

And then they smiled

And looked upon the dolls

Asleep in the fresh June morning.

A chunk broke and fell in the ashes.

The blaze died into a glow of coals.

In the gray beyond the dog irons

The old man saw two figures

Sitting before an awning:

Two golden haired children

Slept in a little bed.

The man and woman who sat beside the shelter

Were old and bent,

Their faces thin and white.

They clasped their hands

And looked into each other's face.

And then they turned and looked

Upon the children.

A coal dropped into the picture,

And the fitful fire died

Into deepening shadows.

Next day the pall-bearers

Bore two bodies away

And lowered a single coffin

Into a grave

Beneath the snow-laden cedar.

A TRAGEDY IN BIRDLAND

A little maiden blue-jay,

Fresh from her April morning bath,

Sat on the limb of a weeping willow,

Preening her shining feathers

And dreaming of a song

To which she had listened

On the afternoon of the preceding day.

A wild joy was in her heart

And yet it took all the sunshine and song

From a hundred other throats

To withstand the gloom

That seemed hovering just above her.

She was conscious of the threatening cloud,

But her heart beat furiously

And hope thrilled her bird-being

With an unwonted light.

And yet she knew,

When she dared to think at all,

That it was a hopeless hope

That flooded her soul with love—

A hope that must ere long

Change to a black despair.

She lifted her crested head

And looked toward the old beech tree

Where her blue-jay lover now sat

In melancholy gloom.

Why not raise her voice

And gladden his heart?

He had been true and faithful

For many weeks,

And his suit would long since

Have won another's love.

Why had she thrilled

At the alien voice of another throat?

She had been a foolish maiden

To have entertained so wild a thought.

But hark! Again the song!

On the topmost spire

Of yonder Gothic poplar

Sits a cardinal fop,

In a coat of matchless red,

And a beak of shining ivory.

He lifts his sumach plume

Into the glinting sunlight

And sends a Cupid shaft

From his beaded eye

Into the trembling breast

Of little maiden blue-jay.

Poor little mademoiselle!

Once more the notes

Come whistling and glittering

Like a shower of pearls

Through the sunshine:

"Oh! my true love is a little blue-jay—

Mademoiselle, my bird gazelle,

My little gazelle, and I love her well.

Fresh and sweet from her morning spray

She sits on the willow and her crest is gay—

Mademoiselle, my little gazelle I love so well."

Down from his commanding height

Flashed the cardinal flame

And perched on another limb

Of the weeping willow.

And then he strutted and pranced

And capered and danced

And shot his fiery glances

Toward the modest little maiden

Whose heart was now fluttering

Beyond all control. Master blue-jay

Over on the beech bough

Saw the terrible tragedy

That would follow in the wake of betrayal

And was desperate to save this Psyche

To whom he had often poured out his soul

In amorous vows,

Swearing by all the gods in birdland

That there was none other beside her.

But like many another lover

Of larger experience and better advantage,

He forgot that the very way

To lose his loved one

Was to berate his rival,

And lifting his reed

To the upper register of a clarinet,

He almost screamed:

"He's a liar, he is, by the god of all birds,

A master of villainous art—

A hypocrite, a varlet, believe not his words,

This dandy, this fop, deceiver, betrayer,

A coward, seducer, a murderous slayer—

He'll crush thy innocent heart."

Poor little maiden blue-jay

Heard his screams of anger and despair

But heeded not the warning.

She only fluttered over

To where the cardinal sat

And threw herself under his protecting arm,

Declaring her perfect faith

In his undying love.

The red prince lifted

His burning plume triumphantly

Into the sunlight,

And shot a contemptuous glance

Toward the old beech tree.

Master Blue-Jay unable

Longer to control himself,

Darted like a lance of blue steel

At the red coat.

But the high churchman was a skilled fencer,

And stepped aside just in time

To send his antagonist

With terrible momentum

Into the thorn tree

Beyond the willow,

Where a moment later he writhed and fluttered,

Pinioned through his body

By a sword-like thorn

That projected from the trunk of the spiny tree.

It was a sight to touch the heart

Of the most abandoned denizen of birdland.

But Mademoiselle Blue-Jay,

Who would ordinarily have wept

At so sad a fate of one of her kind,

Was just now too happy

In the love of her wooer

To notice another;

And unmindful of the ebbing life-blood

That was fast turning her unfortunate lover's coat

Of bright and shining blue

To one of dark and dull maroon,

She nestled close

To the false-hearted ecclesiastic

And sighed the lovelorn sigh

That has come from the maiden heart

Since the foundation of the world.

The low cedar

In which Madam Blue-Jay-Cardinal now sat

On such a nest of eggs

As no blue-jay had ever brooded over before,

Wondering, fearing, doubting, longing—

Was only a rod or so from the spiny thorn

Where the dried body of the fated lover

Still hung.

But where now was the supercilious fop

Whose seductive vows of love

Had won the little maiden's confidence

And robbed her true and faithful lover

Of that incense that belonged of right

Only to him?

For more than a week

She had not seen him.

Surely he would return on the morrow,

For he must remember

That soon the little brood

Would need his protecting love.

Yes, he would return again

To praise her slender form and shining crest

And call her once more his little gazelle.

But the cardinal came not.

The brood had hatched,

And the little birds were covered now

With tiny feathers.

Strange sight!

All the blue-jays in the woods around

Had gathered to witness

What no mortal bird had ever seen before—

Little birdling blue-jays

With crimson stains on wings and breasts!

And the poor little mother,

Madam Blue-Jay-Cardinal,

No longer mademoiselle, the bird gazelle,

But an outcast and disgraced mother

Of a mongrel offspring,

Left alone in this hour of shame,

Remembered now the words of him

Who had warned against this sad hour.

But the memory brought her only bitter grief,

And she watched her brood in broken-hearted sorrow,

As they looked with wondering eyes

At the strange panorama in birdland.

And all the blue-jays sat in silent condemnation

Of the unpardonable sin.

There was no mercy

To be found in all the land of birds

For either the forsaken mother

Or her little brood.

The deserted wife and widowed mother blue-jay

Suddenly threw her wings

Over the astonished little children,

As though to wipe the stain of sin

From their innocent lives,

And as she did so,

The crested cardinal

With a fresh crimson bride flashed by,

And perched upon the old beech limb.

And there he sat

In undisturbed and cynical silence,

While all the court

Of high crimes and misdemeanors

Praised his sacerdotal coat and shining mitre.

The mother felt the birdlings stir beneath her wing,

And their scarlet stain suffuse her being.

She looked toward the thorn tree

But no word was spoken.

A wise old owl that moped and moaned

On the limb of a sycamore tree

That overhung the little stream

Suddenly lifted his voice and cried:

"Let him who is without stain of sin,

Lift the first note of song

Against the little blue-jay."

But all the woods were still.

Only the thorn tree swayed slightly in the breeze,

And then a flute-like note floated out

Upon the wondering air:

"Oh! my little blue-jay, my little bluebell,

I would I could come to thee;

I would find all the food for thy sin-stained brood,

And thy bridegroom I should be.

That villainous fop on the old beech limb

And the arrogant wife that sits by him

Have broken the heart of my little bluebell,

The little gazelle, the bird gazelle he loved so well,

And they laugh in their cynical glee.

Oh! I would heal thy deep chagrin,

Forgive thy blood-stained life its sin,

And thou shouldst be my beauteous bride,

Forever happy at my side.

My hope, my joy, my love, my pride,

If I could only come to thee,

If I could only come to thee."

Again the air was silent as the tomb.

The little mother bird

Moved with her frightened children

Toward the old thorn tree.

And when she at last stood

Beneath the sword

Upon which her faithful lover was pinioned

Behold the miracle that was enacted

Before her wondering eyes.

The crimson dyes

That streaked the birdlings' wings and breasts

Turned suddenly to a dull and dark maroon,

And not a jay in all birdland

But would swear that her little children

Now resembled in every line and stain

The dead body of her valiant lover

Who had shed his blood

To save his little bluebell from betrayal.

Transcriber's Notes:

1. Minor punctuation errors have been corrected without comment.

2. Spelling corrections:

p. 60, "syncophantic" to "sycophantic" (A thousand sycophantic, fawning lords;)

p. 96, "shubbery" to "shrubbery" (O'er a waste of shrubbery and alkali)

3. Word Variations:

"Agagite" (1) and "Aggagite" (1)

"ghost-like" (1) and "ghostlike" (1)

4. On the title page, the words "A Dramatization of Esther" were printed in Gothic Font which has been represented as italic in this e-text.

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Table of Contents

The Blood of Rachel

CONTENTS.

The Blood of Rachel

ACT I

Scene I

Scene II

Scene III

ACT II

Scene I

Scene II

ACT III

Scene I

Scene II

Scene III

POEMS AND SONNETS

Poems and Sonnets

THE OLD DOG IRONS

THE AGE ELECTRIC

GRANDMOTHER DAYS

JUST TO DREAM

AMNEMON

A ROMANCE OF THE CUMBERLAND

MORNING GLORIES.

CHRISTMASTIDE

KINSHIP

PRECOCITY

THE SECRET

A RHYMELESS SONNET

AMBITION

OPPORTUNITY

HOLIDAY THOUGHTS

THE OLD YEAR AND THE NEW

FELLOW TRAVELERS

JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY

CALE YOUNG RICE

PILATE'S MONOLOGUE

THE VIRILE SPIRIT

BLUEBIRD.

AN AUTUMN MINOR

SLABS AND OBELISK

ON BROADWAY

POSTSCRIPT

Postscript

AN EMBER ETCHING

A TRAGEDY IN BIRDLAND

Transcriber's Notes:

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