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SOME WANDER SONGS
AND OTHER VERSE
'By HORATIO WINSLOW

W^

PRINTED BY W. MAYER AT MADISON. WISCONSIN
IN THE FIRST PART OF SEPTEMBER
NINETEEN HUNDRED EIGHT

Of the following poems the

fifth "Wander Song" and ^

"Here's the End of Dream- -^C^rL^h f»

lamd'' appeared originally \u^ re)

in McClure's Magazine. ^ aS Q

To the editors of this maga- » JU ' \ ^ ^

zine I am also indebted for '

the privilege of printing

' ' The Bride ' ' which was

accepted and paid for but

has not yet been published.

Any printed reproduction of

' ' The Bride ' ' is necessarily

prohibited.

I OCT 5 . i^^^

^^J^1•^.

Co mp ^otbtt

I
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COPYRIGHT 1908 BY
HORATIO iVINSLOW

I

I BUILT a house between two hills
Whereon I did devise;
" Who makes an end to wandering

Is cousin to the wise."
But the West Wind laughed and blew the dust
Of the hill tops in mine eyes.

The Black Cloud veiled me; " Ho!" quoth I,

" You have no lure for me
That I should face your rack and storm

And flout my tight roof-tree."
But the Black Cloud laughed and wet my cheek

With the spindrift of the sea

II

A ROARING blaze of driftwood;
The sea-mews overhead;
A heap of sand our pillow;
A length of sand our bed;
The Mother Moon to kiss us
And wrap us with the sky;
And to the place of merry thoughts
My Shadow goes and I.

6

Ill

THE Spring Wind ripples the willows* furs
Whose boughs are blithe with choristers;

And the Spring Wind calls to the sons of men
And we of the hearth go forth again.

There's a road to wander — a beast to kill —
A brave adventure beyond the hill;

There's a girl to find and a fate to mend
And a pot of gold at the rainbow's end.

God send us fortune of following

The vagrant path of the Wind of Spring!

IV

WHEN we lay off o' Diamond Head
A swingin' in the sea,
A voice came roaring from the waves
And the voice it said to me:

" You'll sail through all the seas again

And round to Boston Bay
And there'll you'll find the girl again

That cried for you to stay;

"And you'll live upon the land again

As once you lived before
And you'll be like Christian folk again

And you'll go to sea no more."

8

No more we'll go aloft by night —

No more we'll lie below;
No more we'll freeze by Behring Straits

Nor roast by Callao —
-0-0-
O snug we'll lie in Boston town

When winds go hard ashore —
And brig or bark or man o' war

We'll go to sea no more.

FAITH! It was dawning of yesterday,
And soft in the cool of the sheets I lay;
And I'd clean forgot how I once wierttfree,
When a little bird came and sang to me.

Short was the song and of scanty art,
But it brought the red blood back to my heart;
And 't was never a hymn nor a true-love ode
But the Song — the Song of the Dusty Road.

I've bartered my sheets for a star-lit bed;
I've traded my meat for a crust of bread;
I've changed my book for a sapling cane.
And I'm off to the end of the world again.

10

THE MAGICIAN

THE show is ended and the swarm
Of children gather to implore
The way of cooking cakes in hats
Or growing fifty flags from four.

The wise magician only smiles
And puts them off as best he may,
For well he knows that all the spell
Will vanish if he tells the way.

0 Master Conjurer of All,
Perhaps it would be better fun
To sit and simply watch the show
And never bother how it's done.

11

((

A MANTES, AMENTES ' '

MY Love she is more beautiful
Than scent of rose or myrrH
And I — I lie awake by night
For thinking much on her.

My Love she has the dear, dear voice

As soft as mourning birds;
But I have lost my peace of heart

For her caressing v^ords.

My Love she has the white, white hands

As cool and sweet as wine;
But I have counted all the stars

Since that they touched with mine.

My Love, my Love and not my Love,
If such mad things might be

I would I had forgotten you
Or you remembered me.

12

THE LAST TOAST

THIRTY good men lie out on the heath
And white and staring and drinking the rain,
The raven atop and the bracken beneath —
And here stand other good thirty again.
Ho! what care we for the thirty reft us,
Our throats are dust and the goblets ring;
O hearts of gold, lads, 0 thirty left us,
The King — a toast to the King!

Hark to the crash at the outer door,

The hue and cry of the rebel scum;

And what be thirty to thirty score? —

A toast — Fill all — and the end is come.

The King! The King! — see the moment passes
And Lady Fortune hath taken wing;
A toast and we lie with the shattered glasses —
The King — by God — to the King!

13

THE WORKMEN

CAME to the Workmen one who said,
" The works we do are done in vain:
There is no man shall live again
Or hear God's praise when he is dead.

*' Yea, what shall be the good of us

When Time has crept a little space
And, leering from his later place,

Has seen us one with Daedalus:

"Our cunning caverns blocked with drift;

Our engines rusted into earth;

Our strange devices nothing worth —
Forgotten every trick and shift;

14

"Our songs unsung save by the gust; J^orkmem
Our limnings rotted line and dye;
Our proven things deep buried by

The silent unrefuted dust.

" Fools all! " he cried. Yet undismayed

They smiled and spurred the weary hand
And carved their glimpse of God in sand

And for the joy of making made.

15

College @on00

I

POOR OLD PHARAOH— Sophomore

FROM the deepest pit in the pyramid
Where the dead Egyptian Kings lie hid
Old Pharaoh blinked at me and said,
''Oho! but it's long that I've been dead.

" For many a year and rather more

I've lodged in here on the parlor floor,

And they've wined outside and they've made good

cheer
But it's been almighty dead in here.
The grape in the burial vase has dried
And the glow of my last good glass has died —
The last good glass that my throat shall see . . .
So down a brimming one just for me.

16

" Long, long, ago in the world above ^57

I kissed farewell to my last true love Pharaoh

And she kissed my cheek and she kissed my chin
And she kissed the coffin they put me in.
But now I am scarred with seam and crack
And the red lips flee from the lips burned black
And the true loves stay where the blood runs free . . .
So kiss a pretty one just for me.

17

^]°j " Have you heard the songs in the gray moonlight
Pharaoh Qf the good companions of the night? —
Such songs we sang, my friends and I,
Till the day shot red in the eastern sky.
But now with the dust in my throat stacked deep
And my voice outsung by a cricket^s cheep
All my songs lie dead for eternity , . .
So sing a jolly one just for me. "

So I bought me a drink with a two-ply straw,

And I kissed the prettiest girl I saw

And I sang a rollicking stave of song

For the sake of a chap who'd been dead so long.

18

11

COMMENCEMENT CHANT— Senior

THE lights they shine along the shore — the rip-
ples waver in

And from the far-away there comes the quavering
mandolin:

Tomorrow we must choose for us the ways that we
shall wend

For all our goodly Fellowship hath come unto an
end.

Now must we part with room-mate Jack —

Our more than brother he —
Who slapped us bHthely on the back

Or cursed us gruesomely;
Who paid our debts, who wore our ties,

Who kissed our girls — deceiver! —
Who watched all night with unshut eyes
When we lay blind with fever.
So fare you well, dear Jack we knew

In days and nights delectable;
Two decades — Lord! — to think of you
Fat, Forty and Respectable.

19

S«r'""* Now must we part with dearest Nell,
Chant jhg fairest of the fair,

Who lured us by the subtle spell

Of artless eyes and hair.
We billed and cooed and turtle-doved

Till lo — the Truth stole o'er us:
She was the girl our brothers loved
Some six good years before us.
So fare you well, whose heart was steel;

Yet things go so confoundedly.
It well may chance our sons shall kneel
And pay you court unboundedly.

20

Now must we part with every life SS'"*"*'"

Of these four years of years: ^*'"''

The campus torn by gallant strife,

The Street of Many Beers;
With all good fellows everyone —

(God wot there be no better!)
With book and pen and task ill done
And cap and shoe and sweater.
So fare you well who held us so —

Dead strings we may not strum again,
For Time may come and Time may go
But never you shall come again.

O Laughter, Lights and Light-o-Loves and Talk of

Friend to Friend,
But all our goodly Fellowship —
Yea, all our goodly Fellowship —
Our strangest, strongest Fellowship

Hath come unto an end.

Printed reproduction of this
poem prohibited except by
special permission.

21

THE PASSING OF JUAN
PONCE DE LEON

NOW must I die whose life is lived in vain,
Who dreamed such dreams as never hand hath
penned,
Who suffered all mishap by surf and plain
To buy that which the Lord God would not vend.
Through summer seas and stormy did I wend.
Urged ever by the sea-birds' mocking cries

Till now beneath an evil fate I bend —
The Fount of Youth — I know not where it lies.

From lust of youth and lordship was I fain

To seek the Blissful Isle that it might lend
That which would make me young and free from stain.

Methought with all of Youth yet to expend

The glory of my glory should extend
Throughout all lands — aye even to the skies . . .

And now I die unsought by Fame or Friend,
The Fount of Youth — I know not where it lies.

22

Far off where birds, soft woods, low surges J*j„f^'""^
reign, ^<"!«

^ ' dt Leon

Where the far sea and the horizon blend
There might I seek surcease of all my pain

And live anew the life that God should send: —

The Blissful Isle! — yet I shall never rend
Its veil of mist; and I — though worldly wise

Who know all things youth may not comprehend —
The Fount of Youth — I know not where it lies.

Envoy
Lord God, my soul to thee I do commend,

Unfit, unclean my sore-spent body dies;
Thine is the draught of life withouten end; —

The Fount of Youth — I know not where it lies.

23

I.

A SONNET

To one R. C. who, having set sail from
Hull on the First of September, 1 659, was
shipwrecked off the coast of South America
and cast up on a desert island, the sole sur-
vivor of the crew. Also and secondarily
this sonnet is dedicated to the ingenious
narrator of his adventures — Mr. Daniel
Defoe.

THOU patron saint of those the best of days,
The glorious days when all the books were young;
Before the jade, Experience, had swung
Her vault of Facts wide open to the gaze;
Thou forefarer in boyhood's longed-for ways,
Surely no Heaven boasts thy voice among
It's choirs of calm-eyed angels. Nay, far-flung
And in some lost, lone star thy ghost herds graze.

Ho, I have fought with thee the angry surf.
In dreams uncounted borne thy toil and ills
And built thy castles my hand by thy hand;
And turned with thy rude spade the stubborn turf
And hunted by thy 3i(|e through all the hills —
And I have seen the footprint on the sand!
24

EDEN WOOD

^^ TTTHERE ha' ye been who sing so clear —
VV Who sing so clear and laugh so free?"

" Oh, I ha' been to Eden Wood
Wi' my true love by side o' me."

" What ha' ye seen in Eden Wood?

What sight o' wonder did ye see?"
" I ha' forgot all I ha' seen

Save my love's eyes that looked to me."

"There be strange birds in Eden Wood

That sing a mystic melodie."
" I heard no single sound, I trow.

Save my love's voice that spoke to me."

25

^ood " Deep down — deep down in Eden Wood
The faery flower hangs from the tree — '
" I thought not on the scent of flowers
While my love's hair was close to me."

" Oh, lead me then to Eden Wood
That I may go and joy like ye."

"Alas, I may not win the path

Till my love comes as guide to me."

26

THE BRIDE

TT'S white rose and red rose and roses over all,
A And laughing in the great room and weeping
in the hall,

Wi* rich folk and poor folk and half the country-
side;

And all the little white flowers aquiver for the
Bride.

" She has a gown o' gold and lace, she has
a gown o* silk,

She has a gown from oversea o' satin, white
as milk."

" 0, were she dressed in homespun, it's little
I should care —

I'd take her for the red rose that nestles in
her hair."

" She has a chest o' white money, she has a
chest o' red.

She has a chest o' broidered cloth wi' pearls

and golden thread."
**0h, if she came wi' one chest, or if she

came wi' nine,

I'd take her for the dear eyes that look up
into mine."

27

Brtde "She has a stone of carven red that is a

king's desire,

She has a wonder emerald that burns wi*
gobHnfire."

" Oh, what's the good o' red jewels or emer-
alds o' green

I'd take her for her white breasts to lay my
head between."

It's white rose and red rose and roses high and
low,

And pages brave wi' silk and sash, and brides-
maids in a row;

And low voice and hushed voice and all the talk
has died;

And hark — the fiddles sing their joy and yonder
comes the bride.

Printed reproduction of
this poem prohibited.

28

CHRISTMAS CAROL

WHAT light is this that puts to scorn
Each other star the night hath worn?
Comes it the harbinger of morn
Or shines it for a king new-born?

It shines because The King is born, '

Who are these still and hurrying
That flit as swift as birds a-wing;
Or doers of some evil thing
Or servants of the New-born King?

The Wise Men seek the New-born King.

29

Christ- ^^^ ^^ ^^^ ^^^^ sacrifice
Carol ^^ ^^^ before the mid-dark dies:
Yet how shall I dare lift mine eyes
In that high birth-hall where He lies?
Nay, cradled in a stall He lies.

What gift have I? what shall befall
When I creep to the oxen's stall
A broken man — a prodigal? —
Sure I shall be despised of all.

You shall be welcome most of all.

30

** HERE'S THE END OF
DREAMLAND"

HERE'S the end of Dreamland, here's the
Road of Day;
Kiss me of your kindness and let me go my way.

All the hours we squandered, all the miles we

went.
They were the gold of Dreamland and all the

gold is spent.

Hard and hard, 0 Heart of Me, overhard it

seems: —
Lord! the pleasant palaces ... in the Land of

Dreams.

31

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