Poems of James Russell Lowell Part 40

A PARABLE.

Said Christ our Lord, "I will go and see How the men, my brethren, believe in me."

He pa.s.sed not again through the gate of birth, But made himself known to the children of earth.

Then said the chief priests, and rulers, and kings, "Behold, now, the Giver of all good things; Go to, let us welcome with pomp and state Him who alone is mighty and great."

With carpets of gold the ground they spread Wherever the Son of Man should tread, And in palace-chambers lofty and rare They lodged him, and served him with kingly fare.

Great organs surged through arches dim Their jubilant floods in praise of him, And in church and palace, and judgment-hall, He saw his image high over all.

But still, wherever his steps they led, The Lord in sorrow bent down his head, And from under the heavy foundation-stones, The son of Mary heard bitter groans.

And in church and palace, and judgment-hall, He marked great fissures that rent the wall, And opened wider and yet more wide As the living foundation heaved and sighed.

"Have ye founded your thrones and altars, then, On the bodies and souls of living men?

And think ye that building shall endure, Which shelters the n.o.ble and crushes the poor?

"With gates of silver and bars of gold, Ye have fenced my sheep from their Father's fold: I have heard the dropping of their tears In heaven, these eighteen hundred years."

"O Lord and Master, not ours the guilt, We build but as our fathers built; Behold thine images, how they stand, Sovereign and sole, through all our land.

"Our task is hard,--with sword and flame To hold thy earth forever the same, And with sharp crooks of steel to keep Still, as thou leftest them, thy sheep."

Then Christ sought out an artisan, A low-browed, stunted, haggard man, And a motherless girl, whose fingers thin Pushed from her faintly want and sin.

These set he in the midst of them, And as they drew back their garment-hem, For fear of defilement, "Lo, here," said he, "The images ye have made of me!"

ODE

WRITTEN FOR THE CELEBRATION OF THE INTRODUCTION OF THE COCHITUATE WATER INTO THE CITY OF BOSTON.

My name is Water: I have sped Through strange, dark ways, untried before, By pure desire of friends.h.i.+p led, Cochituate's amba.s.sador; He sends four royal gifts by me: Long life, health, peace, and purity.

I'm Ceres' cup-bearer; I pour, For flowers and fruits and all their kin, Her crystal vintage, from of yore Stored in old Earth's selectest bin, Flora's Falernian ripe, since G.o.d The wine-press of the deluge trod.

In that far isle whence, iron-willed, The New World's sires their bark unmoored, The fairies' acorn-cups I filled Upon the toadstool's silver board, And, 'neath Herne's oak, for Shakspeare's sight, Strewed moss and gra.s.s with diamonds bright.

No fairies in the Mayflower came, And, lightsome as I sparkle here, For Mother Bay-State, busy dame, I've toiled and drudged this many a year, Throbbed in her engines' iron veins, Twirled myriad spindles for her gains.

I, too, can weave; the warp I set Through which the sun his shuttle throws, And, bright as Noah saw it, yet For you the arching rainbow glows, A sight in Paradise denied To unfallen Adam and his bride.

When Winter held me in his grip, You seized and sent me o'er the wave, Ungrateful! in a prison-s.h.i.+p; But I forgive, not long a slave, For, soon as summer south-winds blew, Homeward I fled, disguised as dew.

For countless services I'm fit, Of use, of pleasure, and of gain, But lightly from all bonds I flit, Nor lose my mirth, nor feel a stain; From mill and wash-tub I escape, And take in heaven my proper shape.

So, free myself, to-day, elate I come from far o'er hill and mead, And here, Cochituate's envoy, wait To be your blithesome Ganymede, And brim your cups with nectar true That never will make slaves of you.

LINES

SUGGESTED BY THE GRAVES OF TWO ENGLISH SOLDIERS ON CONCORD BATTLE-GROUND.

The same good blood that now refills The dotard Orient's shrunken veins, The same whose vigor westward thrills, Bursting Nevada's silver chains, Poured here upon the April gra.s.s, Freckled with red the herbage new; On reeled the battle's trampling ma.s.s, Back to the ash the bluebird new.

Poured here in vain;--that st.u.r.dy blood Was meant to make the earth more green, But in a higher, gentler mood Than broke this April noon serene; Two graves are here; to mark the place, At head and foot, an unhewn stone, O'er which the herald lichens trace The blazon of Oblivion.

These men were brave enough, and true To the hired soldier's bull-dog creed; What brought them here they never knew, They fought as suits the English breed; They came three thousand miles, and died, To keep the Past upon its throne; Unheard, beyond the ocean tide, Their English mother made her moan.

The turf that covers them no thrill Sends up to fire the heart and brain; No stronger purpose nerves the will, No hope renews its youth again: From farm to farm the Concord glides, And trails my fancy with its flow; O'erhead the balanced henhawk slides, Twinned in the river's heaven below.

But go, whose Bay-State bosom stirs, Proud of thy birth and neighbor's right, Where sleep the heroic villagers Borne red and stiff from Concord fight; Thought Reuben, s.n.a.t.c.hing down his gun, Or Seth, as ebbed the life away, What earthquake rifts would shoot and run World-wide from that short April fray?

What then? With heart and hand they wrought According to their village light; 'Twas for the Future that they fought, Their rustic faith in what was right.

Upon earth's tragic stage they burst Unsummoned, in the humble sock; Theirs the fifth act; the curtain first Rose long ago on Charles's block.

Their graves have voices; if they threw Dice charged with fates beyond their ken, Yet to their instincts they were true, And had the genius to be men.

Fine privilege of Freedom's host, Of even foot-soldiers for the Right!-- For centuries dead, ye are not lost, Your graves send courage forth, and might.

TO ----.

We, too, have autumns, when our leaves Drop loosely through the dampened air, When all our good seems bound in sheaves, And we stand reaped and bare.

Our seasons have no fixed returns, Without our will they come and go; At noon our sudden summer burns, Ere sunset all is snow.

But each day brings less summer cheer, Crimps more our ineffectual spring, And something earlier every year Our singing birds take wing.

As less the olden glow abides, And less the chillier heart aspires, With drift-wood beached in past spring-tides We light our sullen fires.

By the pinched rushlight's starving beam We cower and strain our wasted sight, To st.i.tch youth's shroud up, seam by seam, In the long arctic night.

It was not so--we once were young-- When Spring, to womanly Summer turning, Her dew-drops on each gra.s.s-blade strung, In the red sunrise burning.

We trusted then, aspired, believed That earth could be remade to-morrow;-- Ah, why be ever undeceived?

Why give up faith for sorrow?