Love Unkind

Out upon the bleak hillside, the bleak hillside, he lay—­
Her lips were red, and red the stream that slipped his life away. 
Ah, crimson, crimson were her lips, but his were turning gray.

The troubled sky seemed bending low, bending low to hide
The foam-white face so wild upturned from off the bleak hillside—­
White as the beaten foam her face, and she was wond’rous eyed.

The soft, south-wind came creeping up, creeping stealthily
To breathe upon his clay-cold face—­but all too cold was he,
Too cold for you to warm, south-wind, since cold at heart was she!

Sweet morning peeped above the hill, above the hill to find
The shattered, useless, godlike thing the night had left behind—­
Wept the sweet morn her crystal tears that love should prove unkind!

Christmas in Heaven

How hushed they were in Heaven that night,
  How lightly all the angels went,
How dumb the singing spheres beneath
  Their many-candled tent!

How silent all the drifting throng
  Of earth-freed spirits, strangely torn
By dim and half-remembered pain
  And joy but newly born!

The Glory in the Highest flamed
  With awful, unremembered ray—­
But quiet as the falling dew
  Was He who went away.

So swift He went, His passing left
  A low, bright door in Heaven ajar—­
With God it was a covenant,
  To man it seemed a star.

I Whispered to the Bobolink

I whispered to the bobolink: 
  “Sweet singer of the field,
Teach me a song to reach a heart
  In maiden armor steeled.”

  “If there be such a song,” sang he,
  “No bird can tell its mystery.”

I bent above the sweetest rose,
  A deeper sweet to stir—­
“O Rose,” I begged, “what charm will wake
  The deep, sweet heart of her?”

  “Alas, poor lover,” sighed the rose,
  “The charm you seek no flower knows.”

I wandered by the midnight lake
  Where heaven lay confessed
“Tell me,” I cried, “what draws the stars
  To lie upon your breast?”

  The silence woke to soft reply
  “When Heaven stoops—­demand not why!”

“Alas, sweet maid, love’s potent charm
  I cannot beg or buy,
I cannot wrest it from the wind
  Or steal it from the sky—­”

  Breathless, I caught her whisper low,
  “I love you—­why, I do not know!”

You

Slanting rain and a sky of gray,
Drifting mist and a wind astray,
The leaden end of a leaden day
And you—­away!

Light in the west!  The sky’s pale dome
Gemmed with a star; a scented gloam
Of bursting buds and rain-wet loam
And you—­at home!