The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete - Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
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Love dies not when he bows his head
To pass beyond the narrow portals,--
The light these glowing moments shed
Wakes from their sleep our lost immortals;
They come as in their joyous prime,
Before their morning days were numbered,--
Death stays the envious hand of Time,--
The eyes have not grown dim that slumbered!
The paths that loving souls have trod
Arch o'er the dust where worldlings grovel
High as the zenith o'er the sod,--
The cross above the sexton's shovel!
We rise beyond the realms of day;
They seem to stoop from spheres of glory
With us one happy hour to stray,
While youth comes back in song and story.
Ah! ours is friendship true as steel
That war has tried in edge and temper;
It writes upon its sacred seal
The priest's _ubique--omnes--semper_!
It lends the sky a fairer sun
That cheers our lives with rays as steady
As if our footsteps had begun
To print the golden streets already!
The tangling years have clinched its knot
Too fast for mortal strength to sunder;
The lightning bolts of noon are shot;
No fear of evening's idle thunder!
Too late! too late!--no graceless hand
Shall stretch its cords in vain endeavor
To rive the close encircling band
That made and keeps us one forever!
So when upon the fated scroll
The falling stars have all descended,
And, blotted from the breathing roll,
Our little page of life is ended,
We ask but one memorial line
Traced on thy tablet, Gracious Mother
"My children. Boys of '29.
In pace. How they loved each other!"
ONCE MORE
ONCE MORE
1868
"Will I come?" That is pleasant! I beg to inquire
If the gun that I carry has ever missed fire?
And which was the muster-roll-mention but one--
That missed your old comrade who carries the gun?
You see me as always, my hand on the lock,
The cap on the nipple, the hammer full cock;
It is rusty, some tell me; I heed not the scoff;
It is battered and bruised, but it always goes off!
"Is it loaded?" I'll bet you! What doesn't it hold?
Rammed full to the muzzle with memories untold;
Why, it scares me to fire, lest the pieces should fly
Like the cannons that burst on the Fourth of July.
One charge is a remnant of College-day dreams
(Its wadding is made of forensics and themes);
Ah, visions of fame! what a flash in the pan
As the trigger was pulled by each clever young man!
And love! Bless my stars, what a cartridge is there!
With a wadding of rose-leaves and ribbons and hair,--
All crammed in one verse to go off at a shot!
"Were there ever such sweethearts?" Of course there were not!
And next,--what a load! it wall split the old gun,--
Three fingers,--four fingers,--five fingers of fun!
Come tell me, gray sages, for mischief and noise
Was there ever a lot like us fellows, "The Boys"?
Bump I bump! down the staircase the cannon-ball goes,--
Aha, old Professor! Look out for your toes!
Don't think, my poor Tutor, to sleep in your bed,--
Two "Boys"--'twenty-niners-room over your head!
Remember the nights when the tar-barrel blazed!
From red "Massachusetts" the war-cry was raised;
And "Hollis" and "Stoughton" reechoed the call;
Till P----- poked his head out of Holworthy Hall!
Old P----, as we called him,--at fifty or so,--
Not exactly a bud, but not quite in full blow;
In ripening manhood, suppose we should say,
Just nearing his prime, as we boys are to-day!
Oh say, can you look through the vista of age
To the time when old Morse drove the regular stage?
When Lyon told tales of the long-vanished years,
And Lenox crept round with the rings in his ears?
And dost thou, my brother, remember indeed
The days of our dealings with Willard and Read?
When "Dolly" was kicking and running away,
And punch came up smoking on Fillebrown's tray?
But where are the Tutors, my brother, oh tell!--
And where the Professors, remembered so well?
The sturdy old Grecian of Holworthy Hall,
And Latin, and Logic, and Hebrew, and all?
"They are dead, the old fellows" (we called them so then,
Though we since have found out they were lusty young men).
They are dead, do you tell me?--but how do you know?
You've filled once too often. I doubt if it's so.
I'm thinking. I'm thinking. Is this 'sixty-eight?
It's not quite so clear. It admits of debate.
I may have been dreaming. I rather incline
To think--yes, I'm certain--it is 'twenty-nine!
"By Zhorzhe!"--as friend Sales is accustomed to cry,--
You tell me they're dead, but I know it's a lie!
Is Jackson not President?--What was 't you said?
It can't be; you're joking; what,--all of 'em dead?
Jim,--Harry,--Fred,--Isaac,--all gone from our side?
They could n't have left us,--no, not if they tried.
Look,--there 's our old Prises,--he can't find his text;
See,--P----- rubs his leg, as he growls out "The next!"
I told you 't was nonsense. Joe, give us a song!
Go harness up "Dolly," and fetch her along!--
Dead! Dead! You false graybeard, I swear they are not!
Hurrah for Old Hickory!--Oh, I forgot!
Well, _one_ we have with us (how could he contrive
To deal with us youngsters and still to survive?)
Who wore for our guidance authority's robe,--
No wonder he took to the study of Job!
And now, as my load was uncommonly large,
Let me taper it off with a classical charge;
When that has gone off, I shall drop my old gun--
And then stand at ease, for my service is done.
_Bibamus ad Classem vocatam_ "The Boys"
_Et eorum Tutorem cui nomen est "Noyes";_
_Et floreant, valeant, vigeant tam,_
_Non Peircius ipse enumeret quam!_
THE OLD CRUISER
1869
HERE 's the old cruiser, 'Twenty-nine,
Forty times she 's crossed the line;
Same old masts and sails and crew,
Tight and tough and as good as new.
Into the harbor she bravely steers
Just as she 's done for these forty years,
Over her anchor goes, splash and clang!
Down her sails drop, rattle and bang!
Comes a vessel out of the dock
Fresh and spry as a fighting-cock,
Feathered with sails and spurred with steam,
Heading out of the classic stream.
Crew of a hundred all aboard,
Every man as fine as a lord.
Gay they look and proud they feel,
Bowling along on even keel.
On they float with wind and tide,--
Gain at last the old ship's side;
Every man looks down in turn,--
Reads the name that's on her stern.
"Twenty-nine!--Diable you say!
That was in Skipper Kirkland's day!
What was the Flying Dutchman's name?
This old rover must be the same.
"Ho! you Boatswain that walks the deck,
How does it happen you're not a wreck?
One and another have come to grief,
How have you dodged by rock and reef?"
Boatswain, lifting one knowing lid,
Hitches his breeches and shifts his quid
"Hey? What is it? Who 's come to grief
Louder, young swab, I 'm a little deaf."
"I say, old fellow, what keeps your boat
With all you jolly old boys afloat,
When scores of vessels as good as she
Have swallowed the salt of the bitter sea?
"Many a crew from many a craft
Goes drifting by on a broken raft
Pieced from a vessel that clove the brine
Taller and prouder than 'Twenty-nine.
"Some capsized in an angry breeze,
Some were lost in the narrow seas,
Some on snags and some on sands
Struck and perished and lost their hands.
"Tell us young ones, you gray old man,
What is your secret, if you can.
We have a ship as good as you,
Show us how to keep our crew."
So in his ear the youngster cries;
Then the gray Boatswain straight replies:--
"All your crew be sure you know,--
Never let one of your shipmates go.
"If he leaves you, change your tack,
Follow him close and fetch him back;
When you've hauled him in at last,
Grapple his flipper and hold him fast.
"If you've wronged him, speak him fair,
Say you're sorry and make it square;
If he's wronged you, wink so tight
None of you see what 's plain in sight.
"When the world goes hard and wrong,
Lend a hand to help him along;
When his stockings have holes to darn,
Don't you grudge him your ball of yarn.
"Once in a twelvemonth, come what may,
Anchor your ship in a quiet bay,
Call all hands and read the log,
And give 'em a taste of grub and grog.
"Stick to each other through thick and thin;
All the closer as age leaks in;
Squalls will blow and clouds will frown,
But stay by your ship till you all go down!"
ADDED FOR THE ALUMNI MEETING, JUNE 29,
1869.
So the gray Boatswain of 'Twenty-nine
Piped to "The Boys" as they crossed the line;
Round the cabin sat thirty guests,
Babes of the nurse with a thousand breasts.
There were the judges, grave and grand,
Flanked by the priests on either hand;
There was the lord of wealth untold,
And the dear good fellow in broadcloth old.
Thirty men, from twenty towns,
Sires and grandsires with silvered crowns,--
Thirty school-boys all in a row,--
Bens and Georges and Bill and Joe.
In thirty goblets the wine was poured,
But threescore gathered around the board,--
For lo! at the side of every chair
A shadow hovered--we all were there!
HYMN FOR THE CLASS-MEETING
1869
THOU Gracious Power, whose mercy lends
The light of home, the smile of friends,
Our gathered flock thine arms infold
As in the peaceful days of old.
Wilt thou not hear us while we raise,
In sweet accord of solemn praise,
The voices that have mingled long
In joyous flow of mirth and song?
For all the blessings life has brought,
For all its sorrowing hours have taught,
For all we mourn, for all we keep,
The hands we clasp, the loved that sleep;
The noontide sunshine of the past,
These brief, bright moments fading fast,
The stars that gild our darkening years,
The twilight ray from holier spheres;
We thank thee, Father! let thy grace
Our narrowing circle still embrace,
Thy mercy shed its heavenly store,
Thy peace be with us evermore!
EVEN-SONG.
1870
IT may be, yes, it must be, Time that brings
An end to mortal things,
That sends the beggar Winter in the train
Of Autumn's burdened wain,--
Time, that is heir of all our earthly state,
And knoweth well to wait
Till sea hath turned to shore and shore to sea,
If so it need must be,
Ere he make good his claim and call his own
Old empires overthrown,--
Time, who can find no heavenly orb too large
To hold its fee in charge,
Nor any motes that fill its beam so small,
But he shall care for all,--
It may be, must be,--yes, he soon shall tire
This hand that holds the lyre.
Then ye who listened in that earlier day
When to my careless lay
I matched its chords and stole their first-born thrill,
With untaught rudest skill
Vexing a treble from the slender strings
Thin as the locust sings
When the shrill-crying child of summer's heat
Pipes from its leafy seat,
The dim pavilion of embowering green
Beneath whose shadowy screen
The small sopranist tries his single note
Against the song-bird's throat,
And all the echoes listen, but in vain;
They hear no answering strain,--
Then ye who listened in that earlier day
Shall sadly turn away,
Saying, "The fire burns low, the hearth is cold
That warmed our blood of old;
Cover its embers and its half-burnt brands,
And let us stretch our hands
Over a brighter and fresh-kindled flame;
Lo, this is not the same,
The joyous singer of our morning time,
Flushed high with lusty rhyme!
Speak kindly, for he bears a human heart,
But whisper him apart,--
Tell him the woods their autumn robes have shed
And all their birds have fled,
And shouting winds unbuild the naked nests
They warmed with patient breasts;
Tell him the sky is dark, the summer o'er,
And bid him sing no more!"
Ah, welladay! if words so cruel-kind
A listening ear might find!
But who that hears the music in his soul
Of rhythmic waves that roll
Crested with gleams of fire, and as they flow
Stir all the deeps below
Till the great pearls no calm might ever reach
Leap glistening on the beach,--
Who that has known the passion and the pain,
The rush through heart and brain,
The joy so like a pang his hand is pressed
Hard on his throbbing breast,
When thou, whose smile is life and bliss and fame
Hast set his pulse aflame,
Muse of the lyre! can say farewell to thee?
Alas! and must it be?
In many a clime, in many a stately tongue,
The mighty bards have sung;
To these the immemorial thrones belong
And purple robes of song;
Yet the slight minstrel loves the slender tone
His lips may call his own,
And finds the measure of the verse more sweet,
Timed by his pulse's beat,
Than all the hymnings of the laurelled throng.
Say not I do him wrong,
For Nature spoils her warblers,--them she feeds
In lotus-growing meads
And pours them subtle draughts from haunted streams
That fill their souls with dreams.
Full well I know the gracious mother's wiles
And dear delusive smiles!
No callow fledgling of her singing brood
But tastes that witching food,
And hearing overhead the eagle's wing,
And how the thrushes sing,
Vents his exiguous chirp, and from his nest
Flaps forth--we know the rest.
I own the weakness of the tuneful kind,--
Are not all harpers blind?
I sang too early, must I sing too late?
The lengthening shadows wait
The first pale stars of twilight,--yet how sweet
The flattering whisper's cheat,--
"Thou hast the fire no evening chill can tame,
Whose coals outlast its flame!"
Farewell, ye carols of the laughing morn,
Of earliest sunshine born!
The sower flings the seed and looks not back
Along his furrowed track;
The reaper leaves the stalks for other hands
To gird with circling bands;
The wind, earth's careless servant, truant-born,
Blows clean the beaten corn
And quits the thresher's floor, and goes his way
To sport with ocean's spray;
The headlong-stumbling rivulet scrambling down
To wash the sea-girt town,
Still babbling of the green and billowy waste
Whose salt he longs to taste,
Ere his warm wave its chilling clasp may feel
Has twirled the miller's wheel.
The song has done its task that makes us bold
With secrets else untold,--
And mine has run its errand; through the dews
I tracked the flying Muse;
The daughter of the morning touched my lips
With roseate finger-tips;
Whether I would or would not, I must sing
With the new choirs of spring;
Now, as I watch the fading autumn day
And trill my softened lay,
I think of all that listened, and of one
For whom a brighter sun
Dawned at high summer's noon. Ah, comrades dear,
Are not all gathered here?
Our hearts have answered.--Yes! they hear our call:
All gathered here! all! all!
THE SMILING LISTENER
1871
PRECISELY. I see it. You all want to say
That a tear is too sad and a laugh is too gay;
You could stand a faint smile, you could manage a sigh,
But you value your ribs, and you don't want to cry.
And why at our feast of the clasping of hands
Need we turn on the stream of our lachrymal glands?
Though we see the white breakers of age on our bow,
Let us take a good pull in the jolly-boat now!
It's hard if a fellow cannot feel content
When a banquet like this does n't cost him a cent,
When his goblet and plate he may empty at will,
And our kind Class Committee will settle the bill.
And here's your old friend, the identical bard
Who has rhymed and recited you verse by the yard
Since the days of the empire of Andrew the First
Till you 're full to the brim and feel ready to burst.
It's awful to think of,--how year after year
With his piece in his pocket he waits for you here;
No matter who's missing, there always is one
To lug out his manuscript, sure as a gun.
"Why won't he stop writing?" Humanity cries
The answer is briefly, "He can't if he tries;
He has played with his foolish old feather so long,
That the goose-quill in spite of him cackles in song."
You have watched him with patience from morning to dusk
Since the tassel was bright o'er the green of the husk,
And now--it 's too bad--it 's a pitiful job--
He has shelled the ripe ear till he's come to the cob.
I see one face beaming--it listens so well
There must be some music yet left in my shell--
The wine of my soul is not thick on the lees;
One string is unbroken, one friend I can please!
Dear comrade, the sunshine of seasons gone by
Looks out from your tender and tear-moistened eye,
A pharos of love on an ice-girdled coast,--
Kind soul!--Don't you hear me?--He's deaf as a post!
Can it be one of Nature's benevolent tricks
That you grow hard of hearing as I grow prolix?
And that look of delight which would angels beguile
Is the deaf man's prolonged unintelligent smile?
Ah! the ear may grow dull, and the eye may wax dim,
But they still know a classmate--they can't mistake him;
There is something to tell us, "That's one of our band,"
Though we groped in the dark for a touch of his hand.
Well, Time with his snuffers is prowling about
And his shaky old fingers will soon snuff us out;
There's a hint for us all in each pendulum tick,
For we're low in the tallow and long in the wick.
You remember Rossini--you 've been at the play?
How his overture-endings keep crashing away
Till you think, "It 's all over--it can't but stop now--
That 's the screech and the bang of the final bow-wow."
And you find you 're mistaken; there 's lots more to come,
More banging, more screeching of fiddle and drum,
Till when the last ending is finished and done,
You feel like a horse when the winning-post 's won.
So I, who have sung to you, merry or sad,
Since the days when they called me a promising lad,
Though I 've made you more rhymes than a tutor could scan,
Have a few more still left, like the razor-strop man.
Now pray don't be frightened--I 'm ready to stop
My galloping anapests' clatter and pop--
In fact, if you say so, retire from to-day
To the garret I left, on a poet's half-pay.
And yet--I can't help it--perhaps--who can tell?
You might miss the poor singer you treated so well,
And confess you could stand him five minutes or so,
"It was so like old times we remember, you know."
'T is not that the music can signify much,
But then there are chords that awake with a touch,--
And our hearts can find echoes of sorrow and joy
To the winch of the minstrel who hails from Savoy.
So this hand-organ tune that I cheerfully grind
May bring the old places and faces to mind,
And seen in the light of the past we recall
The flowers that have faded bloom fairest of all!
OUR SWEET SINGER
J. A.
1872
ONE memory trembles on our lips;
It throbs in every breast;
In tear-dimmed eyes, in mirth's eclipse,
The shadow stands confessed.
O silent voice, that cheered so long
Our manhood's marching day,
Without thy breath of heavenly song,
How weary seems the way!
Vain every pictured phrase to tell
Our sorrowing heart's desire,--
The shattered harp, the broken shell,
The silent unstrung lyre;
For youth was round us while he sang;
It glowed in every tone;
With bridal chimes the echoes rang,
And made the past our own.
Oh blissful dream! Our nursery joys
We know must have an end,
But love and friendship's broken toys
May God's good angels mend!
The cheering smile, the voice of mirth
And laughter's gay surprise
That please the children born of earth.
Why deem that Heaven denies?
Methinks in that refulgent sphere
That knows not sun or moon,
An earth-born saint might long to hear
One verse of "Bonny Doon";
Or walking through the streets of gold
In heaven's unclouded light,
His lips recall the song of old
And hum "The sky is bright."
And can we smile when thou art dead?
Ah, brothers, even so!
The rose of summer will be red,
In spite of winter's snow.
Thou wouldst not leave us all in gloom
Because thy song is still,
Nor blight the banquet-garland's bloom
With grief's untimely chill.
The sighing wintry winds complain,--
The singing bird has flown,--
Hark! heard I not that ringing strain,
That clear celestial tone?
How poor these pallid phrases seem,
How weak this tinkling line,
As warbles through my waking dream
That angel voice of thine!
Thy requiem asks a sweeter lay;
It falters on my tongue;
For all we vainly strive to say,
Thou shouldst thyself have sung!
H. C. M. H. S. J. K. W.
1873
THE dirge is played, the throbbing death-peal rung,
The sad-voiced requiem sung;
On each white urn where memory dwells
The wreath of rustling immortelles
Our loving hands have hung,
And balmiest leaves have strown and tenderest blossoms flung.
The birds that filled the air with songs have flown,
The wintry blasts have blown,
And these for whom the voice of spring
Bade the sweet choirs their carols sing
Sleep in those chambers lone
Where snows untrodden lie, unheard the night-winds moan.
We clasp them all in memory, as the vine
Whose running stems intwine
The marble shaft, and steal around
The lowly stone, the nameless mound;
With sorrowing hearts resign
Our brothers true and tried, and close our broken line.
How fast the lamps of life grow dim and die
Beneath our sunset sky!
Still fading, as along our track
We cast our saddened glances back,
And while we vainly sigh
The shadowy day recedes, the starry night draws nigh.
As when from pier to pier across the tide
With even keel we glide,
The lights we left along the shore
Grow less and less, while more, yet more
New vistas open wide
Of fair illumined streets and casements golden-eyed.
Each closing circle of our sunlit sphere
Seems to bring heaven more near
Can we not dream that those we love
Are listening in the world above
And smiling as they hear
The voices known so well of friends that still are dear?
Does all that made us human fade away
With this dissolving clay?
Nay, rather deem the blessed isles
Are bright and gay with joyous smiles,
That angels have their play,
And saints that tire of song may claim their holiday.
All else of earth may perish; love alone
Not heaven shall find outgrown!
Are they not here, our spirit guests,
With love still throbbing in their breasts?
Once more let flowers be strown.
Welcome, ye shadowy forms, we count you still our own!
WHAT I HAVE COME FOR
1873
I HAVE come with my verses--I think I may claim
It is not the first time I have tried on the same.
They were puckered in rhyme, they were wrinkled in wit;
But your hearts were so large that they made them a fit.
I have come--not to tease you with more of my rhyme,
But to feel as I did in the blessed old time;
I want to hear him with the Brobdingnag laugh--
We count him at least as three men and a half.
I have come to meet judges so wise and so grand
That I shake in my shoes while they're shaking my hand;
And the prince among merchants who put back the crown
When they tried to enthrone him the King of the Town.
I have come to see George--Yes, I think there are four,
If they all were like these I could wish there were more.
I have come to see one whom we used to call "Jim,"
I want to see--oh, don't I want to see him?
I have come to grow young--on my word I declare
I have thought I detected a change in my hair!
One hour with "The Boys" will restore it to brown--
And a wrinkle or two I expect to rub down.
Yes, that's what I've come for, as all of us come;
When I meet the dear Boys I could wish I were dumb.
You asked me, you know, but it's spoiling the fun;
I have told what I came for; my ditty is done.
OUR BANKER
1874
OLD TIME, in whose bank we deposit our notes,
Is a miser who always wants guineas for groats;
He keeps all his customers still in arrears
By lending them minutes and charging them years.
The twelvemonth rolls round and we never forget
On the counter before us to pay him our debt.
We reckon the marks he has chalked on the door,
Pay up and shake hands and begin a new score.
How long he will lend us, how much we may owe,
No angel will tell us, no mortal may know.
At fivescore, at fourscore, at threescore and ten,
He may close the account with a stroke of his pen.
This only we know,--amid sorrows and joys
Old Time has been easy and kind with "The Boys."
Though he must have and will have and does have his pay,
We have found him good-natured enough in his way.
He never forgets us, as others will do,--
I am sure he knows me, and I think he knows you,
For I see on your foreheads a mark that he lends
As a sign he remembers to visit his friends.
In the shape of a classmate (a wig on his crown,--
His day-book and ledger laid carefully down)
He has welcomed us yearly, a glass in his hand,
And pledged the good health of our brotherly band.
He 's a thief, we must own, but how many there be
That rob us less gently and fairly than he
He has stripped the green leaves that were over us all,
But they let in the sunshine as fast as they fall.
Young beauties may ravish the world with a glance
As they languish in song, as they float in the dance,--
They are grandmothers now we remember as girls,
And the comely white cap takes the place of the curls.
But the sighing and moaning and groaning are o'er,
We are pining and moping and sleepless no more,
And the hearts that were thumping like ships on the rocks
Beat as quiet and steady as meeting-house clocks.
The trump of ambition, loud sounding and shrill,
May blow its long blast, but the echoes are still,
The spring-tides are past, but no billow may reach
The spoils they have landed far up on the beach.
We see that Time robs us, we know that he cheats,
But we still find a charm in his pleasant deceits,
While he leaves the remembrance of all that was best,
Love, friendship, and hope, and the promise of rest.