Silent Songs

IF I could ever sing the songs

Within me day and night,

The only fit accompaniment

Would be a lute of light.

A thousand dreamy melodies,

Begot with pleasant pain,

Like incantations float around

The chambers of my brain.

But when I strive to utter one,

It mocks my feeble art,

And leaves me silent, with the thorns

Of Music in my heart!

Richard Henry Stoddard

The Night Before the Bridal

THE bridal flower you gave me,

The rose so pure and white,

I press it to my lips, dear,

With tears of soft delight.

Its odor is so heavy

It makes me faint and pine;

It is thy kiss that freights it,

That sweet, sweet love of thine.

To-morrow thou wilt give me,

For a spell of joy and power,

The hand that gave the rose-bud,

And thy heart, a richer flower.

Then this may fade, and wither,

No longer kissed by me,

For these, my burning kisses,

Will then be showered on thee.

Richard Henry Stoddard

To Edmund Clarence Stedman

(With Shakespeare's Sonnets)

HAD we been living in the antique days,

With him, whose young but cunning fingers penned

These sugared sonnets to his strange-sweet friend,

I dare be sworn we would have won the bays.

Why not? We could have turned in amorous phrase

Fancies like these, where love and friendship blend,

(Or were they writ for some more private end?)

And this, we see, remembered is with praise.

Yes, there's a luck in most things, and in none

More than in being born at the right time;

It boots not what the labor to be done,

Or feats of arms, or art, or building rhyme.

Not that the heavens the little can make great,

But many a man has lived an age too late.

Richard Henry Stoddard

Triumphant Music

AY, give me music! Flood the air with sound!

But let it be superb, and brave, and high,

Not such as leaves my wild ambition bound

In soft delights, but lifts it to the sky.

No sighs, nor tears, but deep, indignant calm,

And scorn of all but strength, my only need;

From whence but Music should my strength proceed?

From some Titanic psalm?

Some thunderous strand of sound, which it its roll

Shall lift to starry heights my fiery soul!

Strike on the noisy drum, and let the fife

Scream like a tortured soul in pain intense,

But let the trumpet brood above their strife,

Victorious in its calm magnificence.

Nor fear to wake again the golden lute,

That runs along my quivering nerves like fire;

Nor let the silver-chorded lyre be mute,

But bring the tender lyre,

For sweetness with all strength should wedded be,

But bring the strength, the sweetness dwells in me!

Play on! play on! The strain is fit to feed

A feast of Gods, in banquet-halls divine;

Not one would taste the cups of Ganymede,

But only drink this more ambrosial wine!

Play on! play on! The secret Soul of Sound

Unfolds itself at every cunning turn;

The trumpet lifts its shield, a stormy round,

The lute its dewy urn,

But in the lyre, the wild and passionate lyre,

Lies all its might, its madness and desire!

Again! again! And let the rattling drum

Begin to roll, and let the bugle blow,

Like winter winds, when woods are stark and dumb,

Shouting above a wilderness of snow.

Pour hail and lightning from the fife and lyre,

And let the trumpet pile its clouds of doom;

But I o'ertop them with a darker plume,

And beat my wings of fire;

Not like a struggling eagle baffled there,

But like a Spirit on a throne of air!

In vain! in vain! We only soar to sink,

Though Music gives us wings, we sink at last;

The peaks of rapture topple near the brink

Of Death, or Madness pallid and aghast.

But still play on, you rapt musicians, play!

But now a softer and serener strain;

Give me a dying fall, that lives again,

Again to die away.

Play on! but softly till my breath grows deep,

And Music leaves me in the arms of Sleep!

Richard Henry Stoddard

The Divan

Persia

A LITTLE maid of Astrakan,

An idol on a silk divan;

She sits so still, and never speaks,

She holds a cup of mine;

'Tis full of wine, and on her cheeks

Are stains and smears of wine.

Thou little girl of Astrakan,

I join thee on the silk divan:

There is no need to seek the land,

The rich bazaars where rubies shine;

For mines are in that little hand,

And on those little cheeks of thine.

Richard Henry Stoddard

In The Harem

THE scent of burning sandal-wood

Perfumes the air in vain;

A sweeter odor fills my sense,

A fiercer fire my brain!

O, press your burning lips to mine!--

For mine will never part,

Until my heart has rifled all

The sweetness of your heart!

The lutes are playing on the lawn,

The moon is shining bright,

But we like stars are melting now

In clouds of soft delight!

Richard Henry Stoddard

The Grape Gatherer

Italy

WELL, I have met you cousin,

Where not a soul can see:

What do you want? "You love me?"

You trifle, Sir, with me.

You love that grape-girl yonder,

The one against the wall:

She climbs, and climbs; but have a care,

A step, and she may fall.

You walked with her this morning,

Her basket on your head:

"'Twas better than my coronet,"

Or something so you said:

"And the grapes and yellow tendrils

Tangled in her hair,

Were brighter than my ringlets,

And all the pearls I wear."

You should have seen her lover,

Hid in the vines hard by,

A swarthy, black-browed fellow,

With a devil in his eye:

He clutched his grape-hook fiercely,

And but that I were near,

He would have slain you, cousin,

And will some night, I fear.

You think she loves you only?

And so thought all the rest:

Why, you had hardly left her

Before the Count was blest.

You doubt? Pray ask her sister,

Or ask the jilted swains,

Or watch, when she's not watching,

'Twill well be worth your pains.

I should be very angry,

'Tis so unworthy you:

Be since you say you jested,

I must forgive, and do.

I own I love you somewhat;

But ere you marry me,

You must do one thing, cousin--

Let my grape gatherers be!

Richard Henry Stoddard

The Sledge at the Gate

Lapland

I WOULD run this arrow straight into my heart

Sooner than see what I saw to-night.

I harnessed my rein-deer, mounted the sledge,

And skimmed the snow by the northern light.

The thin ice crackled, the water roared,

But I crossed the fiord:

I reached the house when the night is late,

What's this? A deer and a sledge at the gate!

The eyes of Zela are winter springs!

But the wealth of summer is in her hair;

But she loves me not, she is false again,

Or why are the sledge and the rein-deer there?

I throw myself down, face-first in the snow:

"Let the false one go!"

She never shall know my love, or my scorn,

For I shall be frozen stiff in the morn.

The sharp winds blew, and my limbs grew chill.

I knew no more till I felt the fire.

They rubbed my breast, and they rubbed my hands,

And my life came back like a dark desire.

She spake kind words, and smoothed my hair,

But the sledge was there!

"Ah false, but fair!" It was all I said,

I struck her down, and away I fled.

I mounted my sledge, and the rein-deer flew,

In the wind, in the snow, in the blinding sleet:

The wolves were hungry--they scented my track--

But I fought them back!

I fear neither wolves, nor the winter's cold,

For the faithless woman has made me bold.

Richard Henry Stoddard

The Serenade of Ma-Han-Shan

China

COME to the window now, beautiful Yu Ying!

The new moon is rising, white as the shell of a pearl.

Your honored father and brother

And the guests are still at table,

Tipping the golden bottles,

But I have stolen to you!

The rose looks over the wall

To see who passes near:

Look out of the window, you,

And see who waits below.

I am a Mandarin: my plume is a pheasant's feather:

The lady who marries me may live at court, if she likes.

I stood by the pond to-day; hundreds of lilies bloomed,

And the wonderful keung-flower grew in the midst of all.

Whenever that marvel happens

A wedding is sure to follow;

It rests with you, Yu Ying,

Speak--is the wedding ours?

We will dwell in Keang-Nan,

For I have a palace there;

My garden is leagues in length,

Deer run wild in the parks:

Cages of loories, macaws; lakes of Mandarin ducks:

A lane bordered with peach-trees--all for sweet Yu Ying.

What means this wonderful light? Is it a second moon?

Yu Ying at her window! A million of thanks, Yu Ying!

Drop me your fan for a gift,

Or better a tress of your hair:

It is but little to give,

For I have given my heart!

The fire-flies twinkle, twinkle,

Under the cypress boughs:

They are wedding each other to-night,

The lights are their wedding lanterns.

When shall I order ours, and come in the flowery chair?

Name me the pearl of a day, my bride, my wife--Yu Ying!

Richard Henry Stoddard

"How are songs begot and bred?"

HOW are songs begot and bred?

How do golden measures flow?

From the heart, or from the head?

Happy Poet, let me know.

Tell me first how folded flowers

Bud and bloom in vernal bowers;

How the south wind shapes its tune,

The harper, he, of June.

None may answer, none may know,

Winds and flowers come and go,

And the selfsame canons bind

Nature and the Poet's mind.

Richard Henry Stoddard

Summer and Autumn

THE hot mid-summer, the bright mid-summer

Reigns in its glory now:

The earth is scorched with a golden fire,

There are berries, dead-ripe, on every brier,

And fruits on every bough.

But the autumn days, so sober and calm,

Steeped in a dreamy haze,

When the uplands all with harvests shine,

And we drink the wind like a fine cool wine--

Ah, those are the best of days!

Richard Henry Stoddard

Uncertain Sounds

THE wind in the leaves,

The rain on the eaves,

Or the low, continuous roar

Of the rolling waves on the distant shore:

Who shall declare

What sounds they be?

Whether lost in the air,

Or found on the sea,

And whether they laugh, or sigh?

Not I.

I only know

That they come, and go,

And people the hollow sky.

Richard Henry Stoddard

Thought

ACROSS the tense chords

Thought runs before words,

Brighter than dew,

And keener than swords.

Whence it cometh,

And whither it goes,

All may conjecture,

But no man knows.

It ebbs and flows

In the dance of the leaves,

The set of summer eves,

The scent of the violets, the odor of the rose.

Richard Henry Stoddard

The Moon on the Spire

THE white clouds lie in drifts to-night

Around the moon, whose silver fire

Kindles the old Cathedral spire,

And makes the cross a living light.

It gleams and twinkles through my blinds,

It shines on those who walk the street,

It opens heaven to those who meet

At vespers with believing minds.

"How marvellous the Cross," they say,

"That crowns the stately Christian pile!

It lends the moon a saintly smile,

It saves the world from day to day."

Ye speak your thoughts, but I who sit

Above the crowd, and watch the moon--

I hear from her cold lips a tune

To other words: and this is it:

"My crescent glitters in the air,

Above the mosque of Moslem lands:

High in his tower the muezzin stands,

And calls the faithful there to prayer.

"By Indian streams, and swamps of rice,

Pagodas rise, and idols frown:

I pour my heathen brightness down,

And make the night a Paradise.

"Pagoda, mosque, and Christian dome,

I see them all; in all the flame

Of worships burns: God sees the same:

God has in each and all His home."

Richard Henry Stoddard