Practice Book, Leland Powers School Part 9

MONT BLANC BEFORE SUNRISE.

Hast thou a charm to stay the morning-star In his steep course? So long he seems to pause On thy bald, awful head, O sovereign Blanc!

The Arve and Arveiron at thy base Rave ceaselessly; but thou, most awful form, Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines, How silently! Around thee, and above, Deep is the air and dark, substantial, black, An ebon ma.s.s: methinks thou piercest it As with a wedge. But when I look again It is thine own calm home, thy crystal shrine, Thy habitation from eternity.

O dread and silent Mount! I gazed upon thee Till thou, still present to the bodily sense, Didst vanish from my thought: entranced in prayer I wors.h.i.+pped the Invisible alone.

Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody,-- So sweet we know not we are listening to it,-- Thou, the mean while wast blending with my thought.

Yea, with my life, and life's own secret joy; Till the dilating soul, enrapt, transfused, Into the mighty vision pa.s.sing--there, As in her natural form, swelled vast to heaven.

Awake, my soul! not only pa.s.sive praise Thou owest! not alone these swelling tears, Mute thanks, and secret ecstasy! Awake, Voice of sweet song! Awake, my heart, awake!

Green vales and icy cliffs! all join my hymn!

Thou first and chief, sole sovereign of the vale!

O, struggling with the darkness all the night, And visited all night by troops of stars, Or when they climb the sky, or when they sink,-- Companion of the morning-star at dawn, Thyself earth's rosy star, and of the dawn Co-herald--wake! O wake! and utter praise!

Who sank thy sunless pillars deep in earth?

Who filled thy countenance with rosy light?

Who made thee parent of perpetual streams?

And you, ye five wild torrents fiercely glad!

Who called you forth from night and utter death, From dark and icy caverns called you forth, Down those precipitous, black, jagged rocks, Forever shattered, and the same forever?

Who gave you your invulnerable life, Your strength, your speed, your fury and your joy, Unceasing thunder, and eternal foam?

And who commanded,--and the silence came,-- "Here let the billows stiffen and have rest?"

Ye ice-falls! ye that from the mountain's brow Adown enormous ravines slope amain-- Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice, And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge!

Motionless torrents! silent cataracts!

Who made you glorious as the gates of heaven Beneath the keen full moon? Who bade the sun Clothe you with rainbows? Who, with living flowers Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at your feet?

"G.o.d!" let the torrents, like a shout of nations, Answer! and let the ice-plain echo, "G.o.d!"

"G.o.d!" sing, ye meadow streams, with gladsome voice Ye pine groves, with your soft and soul-like sounds And they, too, have a voice, yon piles of snow, And in their perilous fall shall thunder, "G.o.d!"

Ye living flowers that skirt the eternal frost!

Ye wild goats sporting round the eagle's nest!

Ye eagles, playmates of the mountain storm!

Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the clouds!

Ye signs and wonders of the elements!

Utter forth "G.o.d!" and fill the hills with praise!

Thou too, h.o.a.r mount! with thy sky-pointing peaks Oft from whose feet the avalanche, unheard Shoots downward, glittering through the pure serene Into the depth of clouds that veil thy breast,-- Thou too, again, stupendous mountain! thou That, as I raise my head, awhile bowed low In adoration, upward from thy base Slow traveling, with dim eyes suffused with tears, Solemnly seemest, like a vapory cloud To rise before me,--rise, oh, ever rise!

Rise, like a cloud of incense, from the earth!

Thou kingly spirit, throned among the hills, Thou dread amba.s.sador from earth to heaven, Great Hierarch! tell thou the silent sky, And tell the stars, and tell yon rising sun, Earth, with her thousand voices, praises G.o.d.

S.T. COLERIDGE.

MY STAR.

All that I know Of a certain star Is, it can throw (Like the angled spar) Now a dart of red, Now a dart of blue, Till my friends have said They would fain see, too

My star that dartles the red and the blue!

Then it stops like a bird; like a flower, hangs furled; They must solace themselves with the Saturn above it.

What matter to me if their star is a world?

Mine has opened its soul to me; therefore I love it.

ROBERT BROWNING.

A CONSERVATIVE.

The garden beds I wandered by One bright and cheerful morn, When I found a new-fledged b.u.t.terfly A-sitting on a thorn, A black and crimson b.u.t.terfly, All doleful and forlorn.

I thought that life could have no sting To infant b.u.t.terflies, So I gazed on this unhappy thing With wonder and surprise, While sadly with his waving wing He wiped his weeping eyes.

Said I, "What can the matter be?

Why weepest thou so sore?

With garden fair and sunlight free And flowers in goodly store--"

But he only turned away from me And burst into a roar.

Cried he, "My legs are thin and few Where once I had a swarm!

Soft fuzzy fur--a joy to view-- Once kept my body warm, Before these flapping wing-things grew, To hamper and deform!"

At that outrageous bug I shot The fury of mine eye; Said I, in scorn all burning hot, In rage and anger high, "You ignominious idiot!

Those wings are made to fly!"

"I do not want to fly," said he, "I only want to squirm!"

And he drooped his wings dejectedly, But still his voice was firm; "I do not want to be a fly!

I want to be a worm!"

O yesterday of unknown lack!

To-day of unknown bliss!

I left my fool in red and black, The last I saw was this,-- The creature madly climbing back Into his chrysalis.

CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN.