The Complete Works of L M Montgomery

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The Complete Works of L M Montgomery Page 766

by L. M. Montgomery


  But gracious greeting and grateful phrase,

  The simple speech

  That plain folk utter each to each.

  Ere over him too darkly lay

  The prophet shadow of Calvary,

  I think he talked in very truth

  With the innocent gayety of youth,

  Laughing upon some festal day,

  Gently, with sinless boyhood’s glee.

  I think if he had ever said

  To a mother apart,

  Cradling her baby’s shining head,

  “Thy man-child is strong of limb and heart,”

  She must have been from that gladsome day

  Thrilled with enduring pride alway,

  Fearless of any future dread,

  Knowing the son upon her knee

  Worthy her pain and love would be.

  Or if by the dusty wayside well,

  From the glare and heat

  Of the burning noon a wayfarer sought

  A moment’s rest where the palm shade fell,

  And he said to him, “The day is hot,

  And your road is rough for wandering feet,”

  Then I think on his way the pilgrim went

  As one who has shared in a sacrament,

  Feeling no longer on him press

  The burden of his weariness.

  If he said to a maid, “The sunset lies

  Redly on Nazareth hills to-night,”

  Each sunset of her life would bring

  A benedictive memory

  Of his haunting face and holy eyes;

  Or if to a bridegroom thus in spring,

  “The wife of thy youth is fair and wise,”

  So would she ever have seemed to be

  In her husband’s sight.

  If he but bade a passing guest

  His meal to share,

  Would not the one so honored deem

  Himself of all most highly blessed,

  The food he ate heaven’s manna rare?

  Or when he to a friend addressed

  A word of thanks for service done,

  Or homely, familiar favor, none

  Of richer recompense could dream.

  No evangelist’s golden pen

  Wrote them for us —

  The words of the Master to those he might meet

  By the carpenter’s bench or in Nazareth street —

  But in them I think there well might be —

  It is surely sweet to fancy thus —

  All of the benediction for men

  All of the tender humanity,

  That leaven the words of his later age

  On the holy page.

  WITH TEARS THEY BURIED YOU TO-DAY

  With tears they buried you to-day,

  But well I knew no turf could hold

  Your gladness long beneath the mould,

  Or cramp your laughter in the clay;

  I smiled while others wept for you

  Because I knew.

  And now you sit with me to-night

  Here in our old, accustomed place;

  Tender and mirthful is your face,

  Your eyes with starry joy are bright —

  Oh, you are merry as a song

  For love is strong!

  They think of you as lying there

  Down in the churchyard grim and old;

  They think of you as mute and cold,

  A wan, white thing that once was fair,

  With dim, sealed eyes that never may

  Look on the day.

  But love cannot be coffined so

  In clod and darkness; it must rise

  And seek its own in radiant guise,

  With immortality aglow,

  Making of death’s triumphant sting

  A little thing.

  Ay, we shall laugh at those who deem

  Our hearts are sundered! Listen, sweet,

  The tripping of the wind’s swift feet

  Along the by-ways of our dream,

  And hark the whisper of the rose

  Wilding that blows.

  Oh, still you love those simple things,

  And still you love them more with me;

  The grave has won no victory;

  It could not clasp your shining wings,

  It could not keep you from my side,

  Dear and my bride!

  IN MEMORY OF “MAGGIE”

  A pussy-cat who was the household pet for seventeen years.

  Naught but a little cat, you say;

  Yet we remember her,

  A creature loving, loyal, kind,

  With merry, mellow purr;

  The faithful friend of many years,

  Shall we not give her meed of tears?

  Sleek-suited in her velvet coat,

  White-breasted and bright-eyed,

  Feeling when she was praised and stroked

  A very human pride;

  A quiet nook was sure to please

  Where she might take her cushioned ease.

  Little gray friend, we shall not feel

  Ashamed to grieve for you;

  Many we know of human-kind

  Are not so fond and true;

  Dear puss, in all the years to be

  We’ll keep your memory loyally.

  REALIZATION

  I smiled with skeptic mocking where they told me you were dead,

  You of the airy laughter and lightly twinkling feet;

  “They tell a dream that haunted a chill gray dawn,” I said,

  “Death could not touch or claim a thing so vivid and so sweet!”

  I looked upon you coffined amid your virgin flowers,

  But even that white silence could bring me no belief:

  “She lies in maiden sleep,” I said, “and in the youngling hours

  Her sealed dark eyes will open to scorn our foolish grief.”

  But when I went at moonrise to our ancient trysting place ...

  And, oh, the wind was keening in the fir-boughs overhead!...

  And you came never to me with your little gypsy face,

  Your lips and hands of welcome, I knew that you were dead!

  THE GARDEN IN WINTER

  Frosty-white and cold it lies

  Underneath the fretful skies;

  Snowflakes flutter where the red

  Banners of the poppies spread,

  And the drifts are wide and deep

  Where the lilies fell asleep.

  But the sunsets o’er it throw

  Flame-like splendor, lucent glow,

  And the moonshine makes it gleam

  Like a wonderland of dream,

  And the sharp winds all the day

  Pipe and whistle shrilly gay.

  Safe beneath the snowdrifts lie

  Rainbow buds of by-and-by;

  In the long, sweet days of spring

  Music of bluebells shall ring,

  And its faintly golden cup

  Many a primrose will hold up.

  Though the winds are keen and chill

  Roses’ hearts are beating still,

  And the garden tranquilly

  Dreams of happy hours to be —

  In the summer days of blue

  All its dreamings will come true.

  THE DIFFERENCE

  When we were together, heart of my heart, on that unforgotten quest,

  With your tender arm about me thrown and your head upon my breast,

  There came a grief that was bitter and deep and straitly dwell with me,

  And I shunned it not, so sweet it was to suffer and be with thee.

  And now when no more against mine own is beating thine eager heart,

  When thine eyes are turned from the glance of mine and our ways are

  far apart,

  A dear and long-sought joy has come my constant guest to be,

  And I love it not, so bitter it is, unfelt, unshared, by thee.

  THE POET

  There was strength in him and the weak won freely from
it,

  There was an infinite pity, and hard hearts grew soft thereby,

  There was truth so unshrinking and starry-shining,

  Men read clear by its light and learned to scorn a lie.

  His were songs so full of a wholesome laughter

  Those whose courage was ashen found it once more aflame,

  His was a child-like faith and wandering feet were guided,

  His was a hope so joyous despair was put to shame.

  His was the delicate insight and his the poignant vision

  Whereby the world might learn what wine-lipped roses know,

  What a drift of rain might lisp on a gray sea-dawning,

  Or a pale spring of the woodland babble low.

  He builded a castle of dream and a palace of rainbow fancy,

  And the starved souls of his fellows lived in them and grew glad; —

  And yet — there were those who mocked the gifts of his generous giving,

  And some — but he smiled and forgave them — who deemed him wholly mad!

  THE MOTHER

  Here I lean over you, small son, sleeping

  Warm in my arms,

  And I con to my heart all your dew-fresh charms,

  As you lie close, close in my hungry hold ...

  Your hair like a miser’s dream of gold,

  And the white rose of your face far fairer,

  Finer, and rarer

  Than all the flowers in the young year’s keeping;

  Over lips half parted your low breath creeping

  Is sweeter than violets in April grasses;

  Though your eyes are fast shut I can see their blue,

  Splendid and soft as starshine in heaven,

  With all the joyance and wisdom given

  From the many souls who have stanchly striven

  Through the dead years to be strong and true.

  Those fine little feet in my worn hands holden ...

  Where will they tread?

  Valleys of shadow or heights dawn-red?

  And those silken fingers, O, wee, white son,

  What valorous deeds shall by them be done

  In the future that yet so distant is seeming

  To my fond dreaming?

  What words all so musical and golden

  With starry truth and poesy olden

  Shall those lips speak in the years on-coming?

  O, child of mine, with waxen brow,

  Surely your words of that dim to-morrow

  Rapture and power and grace must borrow

  From the poignant love and holy sorrow

  Of the heart that shrines and cradles you now!

  Some bitter day you will love another,

  To her will bear

  Love-gifts and woo her ... then must I share

  You and your tenderness! Now you are mine

  From your feet to your hair so golden and fine,

  And your crumpled finger-tips ... mine completely,

  Wholly and sweetly;

  Mine with kisses deep to smother,

  No one so near to you now as your mother!

  Others may hear your words of beauty,

  But your precious silence is mine alone;

  Here in my arms I have enrolled you,

  Away from the grasping world I fold you,

  Flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone!

  TO ONE HATED

  “Hate is only Love that has missed its way.”

  Had it been when I came to the valley where the paths parted asunder,

  Chance had led my feet to the way of love, not hate,

  I might have cherished you well, have been to you fond and faithful,

  Great as my hatred is, so might my love have been great.

  Each cold word of mine might have been a kiss impassioned,

  Warm with the throb of my heart, thrilled with my pulse’s leap,

  And every glance of scorn, lashing, pursuing, and stinging,

  As a look of tenderness would have been wondrous and deep.

  Bitter our hatred is, old and strong and unchanging,

  Twined with the fibres of life, blent with body and soul,

  But as its bitterness, so might have been our love’s sweetness

  Had it not missed the way — strange missing and sad! — to its goal.

  WHILE THE FATES SLEEP

  Come, let us to the sunways of the west,

  Hasten, while crystal dews the rose-cups fill,

  Let us dream dreams again in our blithe quest

  O’er whispering wold and hill.

  Castles of air yon wimpling valleys keep

  Where milk-white mist steals from the purpling sea,

  They shall be ours in the moon’s wizardry,

  While the fates, wearied, sleep.

  The viewless spirit of the wind will sing

  In the soft starshine by the reedy mere,

  The elfin harps of hemlock boughs will ring

  Fitfully far and near;

  The fields will yield their trove of spice and musk,

  And balsam from the glens of pine will fall,

  Till twilight weaves its tangled shadows all

  In one dim web of dusk.

  Let us put tears and memories away,

  While the fates sleep time stops for revelry;

  Let us look, speak, and kiss as if no day

  Has been or yet will be;

  Let us make friends with laughter ‘neath the moon,

  With music on the immemorial shore,

  Yea, let us dance as lovers danced of yore —

  The fates will waken soon!

  THE FAREWELL

  He rides away with sword and spur,

  Garbed in his warlike blazonry,

  With gallant glance and smile for her

  Upon the dim-lit balcony.

  Her kiss upon his lips is warm,

  Upon his breast he wears her rose,

  From her fond arms to stress and storm

  Of many a bannered field he goes.

  He dreams of danger, glory, strife,

  His voice is blithe, his hand is strong,

  He rides perchance to death from life

  And leaves his lady with a song;

  But her blue-brimmed eyes are dim

  With her deep anguish standing there,

  Sending across the world with him

  The dear, white guerdon of her prayer.

  For her the lonely vigil waits

  When ashen dawnlights come and go,

  Each bringing through the future’s gates

  Its presages of fear and woe;

  For her the watch with soul and heart

  Grown sick with dread, as women may,

  Yet keeping still her pain apart

  From the wan duties of the day.

  ’Tis hers to walk when sunsets yield

  Their painted splendors to the skies,

  And dream on some far battlefield

  Perchance alone, unwatched, he dies;

  ’Tis hers to kneel in patient prayer

  When midnight stars keep sentinel,

  Lest the chill death-dews damp the hair

  Upon the brow she loves so well.

  So stands she, white and sad and sweet,

  Upon the latticed balcony,

  From golden hair to slender feet

  No lady is so fair as she;

  He loves her true, he holds her dear,

  But he must ride on dangerous quest,

  With gallant glance and smile of cheer,

  And her red rose upon his breast.

  THE OLD MAN’S GRAVE

  Make it where the winds may sweep

  Through the pine boughs soft and deep,

  And the murmur of the sea

  Come across the orient lea,

  And the falling raindrops sing

  Gently to his slumbering.

  Make it where the meadows wide

  Greenly lie on every side,

  Harvest fields he reaped and t
rod,

  Westering slopes of clover sod,

  Orchard lands where bloom and blow

  Trees he planted long ago.

  Make it where the starshine dim

  May be always close to him,

  And the sunrise glory spread

  Lavishly around his bed.

  And the dewy grasses creep

  Tenderly above his sleep.

  Since these things to him were dear

  Through full many a well-spent year,

  It is surely meet their grace

  Should be on his resting-place,

  And the murmur of the sea

  Be his dirge eternally.

  FOREVER

  I

  With you I shall ever be;

  Over land and sea

  My thoughts will companion you;

  With yours shall my laughter chime,

  And my step keep time

  In the dusk and dew

  With yours in blithesome rhyme;

  In all of your joy shall I rejoice,

  On my lips your sorrow shall find a voice,

  And when your tears in bitterness fall

  Mine shall mingle with them all;

  With you in waking and dream I shall be,

  In the place of shadow and memory,

  Under young springtime moons,

  And on harvest noons,

  And when the stars are withdrawn

  From the white pathway of the dawn.

  II

  O, my friend, nothing shall ever part

  My soul from yours, yours from my heart!

  I am yours and you mine, in silence and in speech,

  Death will only seal us each to each.

  Through the darkness we shall fare with fearless jest,

  Starward we shall go on a joyous new quest;

  There be many worlds, as we shall prove,

  Many suns and systems, but only one love!

  BY AN AUTUMN FIRE

  Now at our casement the wind is shrilling,

  Poignant and keen

  And all the great boughs of the pines between

  It is harping a lone and hungering strain

  To the eldritch weeping of the rain;

  And then to the wild, wet valley flying

  It is seeking, sighing,

  Something lost in the summer olden.

  When night was silver and day was golden;

  But out on the shore the waves are moaning

  With ancient and never fulfilled desire,

  And the spirits of all the empty spaces,

  Of all the dark and haunted places,

 

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