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A Shadow Boat

Naught she knows of sorrow,
Naught of doubt or blight;
Heaven is just above her-

All her thoughts are white.

Long time since I lost her,
That other Me of mine;
She crossed, into Time's shadow
Out of Youth's sunshine.

Now the darkness keeps her;
And, call her as I will,
The years that lie between us
Hide her from me still.

I am dull and pain-worn,
And lonely as can be--

Oh, children, if you meet her,

Send back my other Me!

Grace Denio Litchfield [1849

A SHADOW BOAT

UNDER my keel another boat

Sails as I sail, floats as I float;

Silent and dim and mystic still,

It steals through that weird nether-world,
Mocking my power, though at my will

The foam before its prow is curled,
Or calm it lies, with canvas furled.

Vainly I peer, and fain would see

What phantom in that boat may be

Yet half I dread, lest I with ruth

Some ghost of my dead past divine,

Some gracious shape of my lost youth,
Whose deathless eyes once fixed on mine

Would draw me downward through the brine!

Arlo Bates [1850

437

A LAD THAT IS GONE

Sing me a song of a lad that is gone;
Say, could that lad be I?
Merry of soul he sailed on a day
Over the sea to Skye.

Mull was astern, Rum on the port,
Eigg on the starboard bow;
Glory of youth glowed in his soul:
Where is that glory now?

Sing me a song of a lad that is gone;
Say, could that lad be I?
Merry of soul he sailed on a day
Over the sea to Skye.

Give me again all that was there,
Give me the sun that shone!
Give me the eyes, give me the soul,
Give me the lad that's gone!

Sing me a song of a lad that is gone;
Say, could that lad be I?
Merry of soul he sailed on a day
Over the sea to Skye.

Billow and breeze, islands and seas,
Mountains of rain and sun,

All that was good, all that was fair,

All that was me is gone.

Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894]

CARCASSONNE *

"I'm growing old, I've sixty years;
I've labored all my life in vain.
In all that time of hopes and fears,

I've failed my dearest wish to gain.

*For the original of this poem see page 3844.

Carcassonne

I see full well that here below

Bliss unalloyed there is for none;
My prayer would else fulfilment know-
Never have I seen Carcassonne!

"You see the city from the hill,
It lies beyond the mountains blue;
And yet to reach it one must still
Five long and weary leagues pursue,
And, to return, as many more.

Had but the vintage plenteous grown—
But, ah! the grape withheld its store.
I shall not look on Carcassonne!

"They tell me every day is there

Not more or less than Sunday gay; In shining robes and garments fair The people walk upon their way. One gazes there on castle walls

As grand as those of Babylon,

A bishop and two generals!

What joy to dwell in Carcassonne!

"The vicar's right: he says that we Are ever wayward, weak, and blind; He tells us in his homily

Ambition ruins all mankind;

Yet could I there two days have spent,
While still the autumn sweetly shone,

Ah, me! I might have died content
When I had looked on Carcassonne.

"Thy pardon, Father, I beseech,
In this my prayer if I offend;
One something sees beyond his reach
From childhood to his journey's end.

My wife, our little boy, Aignan,

Have travelled even to Narbonne; My grandchild has seen Perpignan;

And I have not seen Carcassonne!"

439

So crooned, one day, close by Limoux,
A peasant, double-bent with age.
"Rise up, my friend," said I; "with you
I'll go upon this pilgrimage."

We left, next morning, his abode,

But (Heaven forgive him!) half-way on

The old man died upon the road.

He never gazed on Carcassonne.

Translated by John R. Thompson from the French of

Gustave Nadaud [1820- ? ]

CHILDHOOD

OLD Sorrow I shall meet again,

And Joy, perchance-but never, never,
Happy Childhood, shall we twain
See each other's face forever!

And yet I would not call thee back,

Dear Childhood, lest the sight of me,

Thine old companion, on the rack
Of Age, should sadden even thee.
John Banister Tabb [1845-1909]

THE WASTREL

ONCE, when I was little, as the summer night was falling, Among the purple upland fields I lost my barefoot way; The road to home was hidden fast, and frightful shadows, crawling

Along the sky-line, swallowed up the last kind light of day;

And then I seemed to hear you

In the twilight, and be near you; Seemed to hear your dear voice callingThrough the meadows, calling, calling

And I followed and I found you,

Flung my tired arms around you,

And rested on the mother-breast, returned, tired out from

play.

Troia Fuit

Down the days from that day, though I trod strange

paths unheeding,

Though I chased the jack-o'-lanterns of so many mad

dened years,

Though I never looked behind me, where the home-lights
were receding,

Though I never looked enough ahead to ken the Inn of
Fears;

Still I knew your heart was near me,

That your ear was strained to hear me,
That your love would need no pleading
To forgive me, but was pleading
Of its self that, in disaster,

I should run to you the faster

And be sure that I was dearer for your sacrifice of tears.

Now on life's last Summertime the long last dusk is falling,
And I, who trod one way so long, can tread no other way
Until at death's dim crossroads I watch, hesitant, the
crawling

Night-passages that maze me with the ultimate dismay.
Then when Death and Doubt shall blind me-
Even then-I know you'll find me:

I shall hear you, Mother, calling—
Hear you calling-calling-calling:

I shall fight and follow--find you

Though the grave-clothes swathe and bind you,

And I know your love will answer: "Here's my laddie

home from play!"

Reginald Wright Kauffman [1877

TROIA FUIT

THE world was wide when I was young,
My schoolday hills and dales among;
But, oh, it needs no Puck to put,
With whipping wing and flying foot,
A girdle 'round the narrow sphere
In which I labor now and here!

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