Poems New and Old - John Freeman

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clearer,

       Grows spiritual and dearer.

       Table of Contents

      Unconscious on thy lap I lay,

       A spiritual thing,

       Stirless until the yet unlooked-for day

       Of human birth

       Should call me from thy starry twilight, Earth.

       And did thy bosom rock and clear voice sing?

       I know not—now no more a spiritual thing.

       Nor then thy breathed Adieu

       I rightly knew.

      —Until those human kind arms caught

       And nursed my head

       Upon her breast who from the twilight brought

       This stranger me.

       Mother, it were yet happiness to be

       Within your arms; but now that you are dead

       Your memory sleeps in mine; so mine is comforted,

       Though I breathed dear Adieu

       Unheard by you.

      And I have gathered to my breast

       Wife, mistress, child,

       Affections insecure but tenderest

       Of all that clutch

       Man's heart with their "Too little!" and "Too much!"

       O, what anxieties, what passions wild

       Bind and unbind me, what storms never to be stilled

       Until Adieu, Adieu

       Breathe the night through.

      O, when all last farewells are said

       To these most dear;

       O, when within my purged heart peace is shed;

       When these old sweet

       Humanities move out on hushing feet,

       And all is hush; then in that silence clear

       Who is it comes again—near and near and near,

       Even while the sighed Adieu

       Fades the hush through?

      O, is it on thy breast I fall,

       A spiritual thing

       Once more, and hear with ear insensual

       The voice of primal Earth

       Breathed gently as on Eden faint airs forth;

       And so contented to thy bosom cling,

       Though all those loves are gone nor faithful echoes ring,

       Nor fond Adieu, Adieu

       My parted spirit pursue?

      —So hidden in green darkness deep,

       Feel when I wake

       The tides of night and day upon thee sweep,

       And know thy forehead bared before the East,

       And hear thy forests hushing in the West

       And in thy bosom, Earth, the slow heart shake:

       But hear no more the infinite forest murmurs break

       Into Adieu, Adieu,

       No more Adieu!

       Table of Contents

      I reached the cottage. I knew it from the card

       He had given me—the low door heavily barred,

       Steep roof, and two yews whispering on guard.

      Dusk thickened as I came, but I could smell

       First red wallflower and an early hyacinth bell,

       And see dim primroses. "O, I can tell,"

      I thought, "they love the flowers he loved." The rain

       Shook from fruit bushes in new showers again

       As I brushed past, and gemmed the window pane.

      Bare was the window yet, and the lamp bright.

       I saw them sitting there, streamed with the light

       That overflowed upon the enclosing night.

      "Poor things, I wonder why they've lit up so,"

       A voice said, passing on the road below.

       "Who are they?" asked another. "Don't you know?"

      Their voices crept away. I heard no more

       As I crossed the garden and knocked at the door.

       I waited, then knocked louder than before,

      And thrice, and still in vain. So on the grass

       I stepped, and tap-tapped on the rainy glass.

       Then did a girl without turning towards me pass

      From the room. I heard the heavy barred door creak,

       And a voice entreating from the doorway speak,

       "Will you come this way?"—a voice childlike and quick.

      The way was dark. I followed her white frock,

       Past the now-chiming, sweet-tongued unseen clock,

       Into the room. One figure like a rock

      Draped in an unstarred night—his mother—bowed

       Unrising and unspeaking. His aunt stood

       And took my hand, murmuring, "So good, so good!"

      Never such quiet people had I known.

       Voices they scarcely needed, they had grown

       To talk less by the word than muted tone.

      "We'll soon have tea," the girl said. "Please sit here."

       She pushed a heavy low deep-seated chair

       I knew at once was his; and I sat there.

      I could not look at them. It seemed I made

       Noise in that quietness. I was afraid

       To look or speak until the aunt's voice said,

      "You were his friend." And that "You were!" awoke

       My sense, and nervousness found voice and spoke

       Of what he had been, until a bullet broke

      A too-brief friendship. The rock-like mother kept

       Night still around her. The aunt silently wept,

       And the girl into the screen's low shadow stept.

      "You were great friends," said with calm voice the mother.

       I answered, "Never friend had such another."

       Then the girl's lips, "Nor sister such a brother."

      Her words were like a sounding pebble cast

       Into a hollow silence; but at last

       She moved and bending to my low chair passed

      Swift leaf-like fingers o'er my face and said,

       "You are not like him." And as she turned her head

       Into full light beneath the lamp's green shade

      I saw the sunken spaces of her eyes.

       Then her face listening to my dumb surprise.

      

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