The Poems of Emma Lazarus Volume I Part 3

And now, at the end, we ask, Has the grave really closed over all these gifts? Has that eager, pa.s.sionate striving ceased, and "is the rest silence?"

Who knows? But would we break, if we could, that repose, that silence and mystery and peace everlasting?

EPOCHS.

"The epochs of our life are not in the facts, but in the silent thought by the wayside as we walk."--Emerson

I. Youth.

Sweet empty sky of June without a stain, Faint, gray-blue dewy mists on far-off hills, Warm, yellow sunlight flooding mead and plain, That each dark copse and hollow overfills; The rippling laugh of unseen, rain-fed rills, Weeds delicate-flowered, white and pink and gold, A murmur and a singing manifold.

The gray, austere old earth renews her youth With dew-lines, suns.h.i.+ne, gossamer, and haze.

How still she lies and dreams, and veils the truth, While all is fresh as in the early days!

What simple things be these the soul to raise To bounding joy, and make young pulses beat, With nameless pleasure finding life so sweet.

On such a golden morning forth there floats, Between the soft earth and the softer sky, In the warm air adust with glistening motes, The mystic winged and flickering b.u.t.terfly, A human soul, that hovers giddily Among the gardens of earth's paradise, Nor dreams of fairer fields or loftier skies.

II. Regret.

Thin summer rain on gra.s.s and bush and hedge, Reddening the road and deepening the green On wide, blurred lawn, and in close-tangled sedge; Veiling in gray the landscape stretched between These low broad meadows and the pale hills seen But dimly on the far horizon's edge.

In these transparent-clouded, gentle skies, Wherethrough the moist beams of the soft June sun Might any moment break, no sorrow lies, No note of grief in swollen brooks that run, No hint of woe in this subdued, calm tone Of all the prospect unto dreamy eyes.

Only a tender, unnamed half-regret For the lost beauty of the gracious morn; A yearning aspiration, fainter yet, For brighter suns in joyous days unborn, Now while brief showers ruffle gra.s.s and corn, And all the earth lies shadowed, grave, and wet;

s.p.a.ce for the happy soul to pause again From pure content of all unbroken bliss, To dream the future void of grief and pain, And muse upon the past, in reveries More sweet for knowledge that the present is Not all complete, with mist and clouds and rain.

III. Longing.

Look westward o'er the steaming rain-washed slopes, Now satisfied with suns.h.i.+ne, and behold Those l.u.s.trous clouds, as glorious as our hopes, Softened with feathery fleece of downy gold, In all fantastic, huddled shapes uprolled, Floating like dreams, and melting silently, In the blue upper regions of pure sky.

The eye is filled with beauty, and the heart Rejoiced with sense of life and peace renewed; And yet at such an hour as this, upstart Vague myriad longing, restless, unsubdued, And causeless tears from melancholy mood, Strange discontent with earth's and nature's best, Desires and yearnings that may find no rest.

IV. Storm.

Serene was morning with clear, winnowed air, But threatening soon the low, blue ma.s.s of cloud Rose in the west, with mutterings faint and rare At first, but waxing frequent and more loud.

Thick sultry mists the distant hill-tops shroud; The suns.h.i.+ne dies; athwart black skies of lead Flash noiselessly thin threads of lightning red.

Breathless the earth seems waiting some wild blow, Dreaded, but far too close to ward or shun.

Scared birds aloft fly aimless, and below Naught stirs in fields whence light and life are gone, Save floating leaves, with wisps of straw and down, Upon the heavy air; 'neath blue-black skies, Livid and yellow the green landscape lies.

And all the while the dreadful thunder breaks, Within the hollow circle of the hills, With gathering might, that angry echoes wakes, And earth and heaven with unused clamor fills.

O'erhead still flame those strange electric thrills.

A moment more,--behold! yon bolt struck home, And over ruined fields the storm hath come!

V. Surprise.

When the stunned soul can first lift tired eyes On her changed world of ruin, waste and wrack, Ah, what a pang of aching sharp surprise Brings all sweet memories of the lost past back, With wild self-pitying grief of one betrayed, Duped in a land of dreams where Truth is dead!

Are these the heavens that she deemed were kind?

Is this the world that yesterday was fair?

What painted images of folk half-blind Be these who pa.s.s her by, as vague as air?

What go they seeking? there is naught to find.

Let them come nigh and hearken her despair.

A mocking lie is all she once believed, And where her heart throbbed, is a cold dead stone.

This is a doom we never preconceived, Yet now she cannot fancy it undone.

Part of herself, part of the whole hard scheme, All else is but the shadow of a dream.

VI. Grief.

There is a hungry longing in the soul, A craving sense of emptiness and pain, She may not satisfy nor yet control, For all the teeming world looks void and vain.