Toward the Gulf Part 21

Let him read who can: I was a swift runner whom they tripped.

MY LIGHT WITH YOURS

I

When the sea has devoured the s.h.i.+ps, And the spires and the towers Have gone back to the hills.

And all the cities Are one with the plains again.

And the beauty of bronze, And the strength of steel Are blown over silent continents, As the desert sand is blown-- My dust with yours forever.

II

When folly and wisdom are no more, And fire is no more, Because man is no more; When the dead world slowly spinning Drifts and falls through the void-- My light with yours In the Light of Lights forever!

THE BLIND

Amid the din of cars and automobiles, At the corner of a towering pile of granite, Under the city's soaring brick and stone, Where mult.i.tudes go hurrying by, you stand With eyeless sockets playing on a flute.

And an old woman holds the cup for you, Wherein a curious pa.s.ser by at times Casts a poor coin.

You are so blind you cannot see us men As walking trees!

I fancy from the tune You play upon the flute, you have a vision Of leafy trees along a country road-side, Where wheat is growing and the meadow-larks Rise singing in the sun-s.h.i.+ne!

In your darkness You may see such things playing on your flute Here in the granite ways of mad Chicago!

And here's another on a farther corner, With head thrown back as if he searched the skies, He's selling evening papers, what's to him The flaring headlines? Yet he calls the news.

That is his flute, perhaps, for one can call, Or play the flute in blindness.

Yet I think It's neither news nor music with these blind ones-- Rather the hope of re-created eyes, And a light out of death!

"How can it be," I hear them over and over, "There never shall be eyes for me again?"

"I PAY MY DEBT FOR LAFAYETTE AND ROCHAMBEAU"

--_His Own Words_

IN MEMORY OF KIFFIN ROCKWELL

Eagle, whose fearless Flight in vast s.p.a.ces Clove the inane, While we stood tearless, White with rapt faces In wonder and pain. ...

Heights could not awe you, Depths could not stay you.

Anguished we saw you, Saw Death way-lay you Where the storm flings Black clouds to thicken Round France's defender!

Archangel stricken From ramparts of splendor-- Shattered your wings! ...

But Lafayette called you, Rochambeau beckoned.

Duty enthralled you.

For France you had reckoned Her gift and your debt.

Dull hearts could harden Half-G.o.ds could palter.

For you never pardon If Liberty's altar You chanced to forget. ...

Stricken archangel!

Ramparts of splendor Keep you, evangel Of souls who surrender No banner unfurled For ties ever living, Where Freedom has bound them.

Praise and thanksgiving For love which has crowned them-- Love frees the world! ...

CHRISTMAS AT INDIAN POINT

Who is that calling through the night, A wail that dies when the wind roars?

We heard it first on s.h.i.+pley's Hill, It faded out at Comingoer's.

Along five miles of wintry road A horseman galloped with a cry, "'Twas two o'clock," said Herman Pointer, "When I heard clattering hoofs go by."

"I flung the winder up to listen; I heerd him there on Gordon's Ridge; I heerd the loose boards b.u.mp and rattle When he went over Houghton's Bridge."

Said Roger Ragsdale: "I was doctorin'

A heifer in the barn, and then My boy says: 'Pap, that's Billy Paris.'

'There,' says my boy, it is again."

"Says I: 'That kain't be Billy Paris, We seed 'im at the Christmas tree.

It's two o'clock,' says I, 'and Billy I seed go home with Emily.'

"'He is too old for galavantin'

Upon a night like this,' says I.

'Well, pap,' says he, 'I know that frosty, Good-natured huskiness in that cry.'

"'It kain't be Billy,' says I, swabbin'

The heifer's tongue and mouth with brine, 'I never thought--it makes me s.h.i.+ver, And goose-flesh up and down the spine.'"

Said Doggie Traylor: "When I heard it I 'lowed 'twas Pin Hook's rowdy new 'uns.

Them Cashner boys was at the schoolhouse Drinkin' there at the Christmas doin's."

Said Pete McCue: "I lit a candle And held it up to the winder pane.

But when I heerd again the holler 'Twere half-way down the Bowman Lane."

Said Andy Ensley: "First I knowed I thought he'd thump the door away.

I hopped from bed, and says, 'Who is it?'