Part 25

SAY SOMETHING TO ME

Say something to me! I've waited so long-- Waited and wondered in vain; Only a sentence would fall like a song Over this listening pain-- Over a silence that glowers and frowns,-- Even my pencil to-night Slips in the dews of my sorrow and wounds Each tender word that I write.

Say something to me--if only to tell Me you remember the past; Let the sweet words, like the notes of a bell, Ring out my vigil at last. O it were better, far better than this Doubt and distrust in the breast,-- For in the wine of a fanciful kiss I could taste Heaven, and--rest.

Say something to me! I kneel and I plead, In my wild need, for a word; If my poor heart from this silence were freed, I could soar up like a bird In the glad morning, and twitter and sing, Carol and warble and cry Blithe as the lark as he cruises awing Over the deeps of the sky.

LEONAINIE

Leonainie--Angels named her; And they took the light Of the laughing stars and framed her In a smile of white; And they made her hair of gloomy Midnight, and her eyes of bloomy Moonshine, and they brought her to me In the solemn night.--

In a solemn night of summer, When my heart of gloom Blossomed up to greet the comer Like a rose in bloom; All forebodings that distressed me I forgot as Joy caressed me-- (LYING Joy! that caught and pressed me In the arms of doom!)

Only spake the little lisper In the Angel-tongue; Yet I, listening, heard her whisper,-- "Songs are only sung Here below that they may grieve you-- Tales but told you to deceive you,-- So must Leonainie leave you While her love is young."

Then God smiled and it was morning. Matchless and supreme Heaven's glory seemed adorning Earth with its esteem: Every heart but mine seemed gifted With the voice of prayer, and lifted Where my Leonainie drifted From me like a dream.

A TEST OF LOVE

"Now who shall say he loves me not."

He wooed her first in an atmosphere Of tender and low-breathed sighs; But the pang of her laugh went cutting clear To the soul of the enterprise; "You beg so pert for the kiss you seek It reminds me, John," she said, "Of a poodle pet that jumps to 'speak' For a crumb or a crust of bread."

And flashing up, with the blush that flushed His face like a tableau-light, Came a bitter threat that his white lips hushed To a chill, hoarse-voiced "Good night!" And again her laugh, like a knell that tolled, And a wide-eyed mock surprise,-- "Why, John," she said, "you have taken cold In the chill air of your sighs!"

And then he turned, and with teeth tight clenched, He told her he hated her,-- That his love for her from his heart he wrenched Like a corpse from a sepulcher. And then she called him "a ghoul all red With the quintessence of crimes"-- "But I know you love me now," she said, And kissed him a hundred times.

FATHER WILLIAM

A NEW VERSION BY LEE O. HARRIS AND JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY

"You are old, Father William, and though one would think All the veins in your body were dry, Yet the end of your nose is red as a pink; I beg your indulgence, but why?"

"You see," Father William replied, "in my youth-- 'Tis a thing I must ever regret-- It worried me so to keep up with the truth That my nose has a flush on it yet."

"You are old," said the youth, "and I grieve to detect A feverish gleam in your eye; Yet I'm willing to give you full time to reflect. Now, pray, can you answer me why?"

"Alas," said the sage, "I was tempted to choose Me a wife in my earlier years, And the grief, when I think that she didn't refuse, Has reddened my eyelids with tears."

"You are old, Father William," the young man said, "And you never touch wine, you declare, Yet you sleep with your feet at the head of the bed; Now answer me that if you dare."

"In my youth," said the sage, "I was told it was true, That the world turned around in the night; I cherished the lesson, my boy, and I knew That at morning my feet would be right."

"You are old," said the youth, "and it grieved me to note, As you recently fell through the door, That 'full as a goose' had been chalked on your coat; Now answer me that I implore."

"My boy," said the sage, "I have answered you fair, While you stuck to the point in dispute, But this is a personal matter, and there Is my answer--the toe of my boot."

WHAT THE WIND SAID

'I muse to-day, in a listless way, In the gleam of a summer land; I close my eyes as a lover may At the touch of his sweetheart's hand, And I hear these things in the whisperings Of the zephyrs round me fanned':--

I am the Wind, and I rule mankind, And I hold a sovereign reign Over the lands, as God designed, And the waters they contain: Lo! the bound of the wide world round Falleth in my domain!

I was born on a stormy morn In a kingdom walled with snow, Whose crystal cities laugh to scorn The proudest the world can show; And the daylight's glare is frozen there In the breath of the blasts that blow.