1 The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Poems of Henry Van Dyke, by Henry Van Dyke This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net Title: The Poems of Henry Van Dyke Author: Henry Van Dyke Release Date: July 7, 2005 [EBook #16229] Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 • START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE POEMS OF HENRY VAN DYKE *** Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Daniel Emerson Griffith and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net BY HENRY VAN DYKE Six Days of the Week Little Rivers Fisherman's Luck Days Off Out-of-Doors in the Holy Land The Ruling Passion The Blue Flower 2 The Unknown Quantity The Valley of Vision Camp-Fires and Guide-Posts Companionable Books Poems, Collection in one volume Songs out of Doors Golden Stars The Red Flower The Grand Canyon, and Other Poems The White Bees, and Other Poems The Builders, and Other Poems Music, and Other Poems The Toiling of Felix, and Other Poems The House of Rimmon Studies in Tennyson Poems of Tennyson Fighting for Peace CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS THE POEMS OF HENRY VAN DYKE A NEW AND REVISED EDITION WITH MANY HITHERTO UNCOLLECTED LONDON ARTHUR F. BIRD MCMXXV [From an edition:] Printed by The Scribner Press, New York, U.S.A. 3 Dedicated in Friendship to KATRINA TRASK AND JOHN HUSTON FINLEY CONTENTS SONGS OUT OF DOORS EARLY VERSES The After-Echo Dulciora Three Alpine Sonnets Matins The Parting and the Coming Guest If All the Skies Wings of a Dove The Fall of the Leaves A Snow-Song Roslin and Hawthornden SONGS OUT OF DOORS LATER POEMS When Tulips Bloom The Whip-Poor-Will The Lily of Yorrow The Veery The Song-Sparrow The Maryland Yellow-Throat A November Daisy 4 The Angler's Reveille The Ruby-Crowned Kinglet School Indian Summer Spring in the North Spring in the South A Noon Song Light Between the Trees The Hermit Thrush Turn o' the Tide Sierra Madre The Grand Canyon The Heavenly Hills of Holland Flood-Tide of Flowers God of the Open Air NARRATIVE POEMS The Toiling of Felix Vera Another Chance A Legend of Service The White Bees New Year's Eve The Vain King The Foolish Fir-Tree "Gran' Boule" Heroes of the "Titanic" The Standard-Bearer The Proud Lady LABOUR AND ROMANCE A Mile with Me The Three Best Things Reliance 5 Doors of Daring The Child in the Garden Love's Reason The Echo in the Heart "Undine" "Rencontre" Love in a Look My April Lady A Lover's Envy Fire-Fly City The Gentle Traveller Nepenthe Day and Night Hesper Arrival Departure The Black Birds Without Disguise An Hour "Rappelle-Toi" Love's Nearness Two Songs of Heine Eight Echoes from the Poems of Auguste Angellier Rappel d'Amour The River of Dreams HEARTH AND ALTAR A Home Song "Little Boatie" A Mother's Birthday Transformation Rendezvous Gratitude Peace Santa Christina 6 The Bargain To the Child Jesus Bitter-Sweet Hymn of Joy Song of a Pilgrim-Soul Ode to Peace Three Prayers for Sleep and Waking Portrait and Reality The Wind of Sorrow Hide and Seek Autumn in the Garden The Message Dulcis Memoria The Window Christmas Tears Dorothea, 1888-1912 EPIGRAMS, GREETINGS, AND INSCRIPTIONS For Katrina's Sun-Dial For Katrina's Window For the Friends at Hurstmont The Sun-Dial at Morven The Sun-Dial at Wells College To Mark Twain Stars and the Soul To Julia Marlowe To Joseph Jefferson The Mocking-Bird The Empty Quatrain Pan Learns Music The Shepherd of Nymphs Echoes from the Greek Anthology One World Joy and Duty The Prison and the Angel 7 The Way Love and Light Facta non Verba Four Things The Great River Inscription for a Tomb in England The Talisman Thorn and Rose "The Signs" PRO PATRIA Patria America The Ancestral Dwellings Hudson's Last Voyage Sea-Gulls of Manhattan A Ballad of Claremont Hill Urbs Coronata Mercy for Armenia Sicily, December, 1908 "Come Back Again, Jeanne d'Arc" National Monuments The Monument of Francis Makemie The Statue of Sherman by St. Gaudens "America for Me" The Builders Spirit of the Everlasting Boy Texas Who Follow the Flag Stain not the Sky Peace-Hymn of the Republic THE RED FLOWER AND GOLDEN STARS 8 The Red Flower A Scrap of Paper Stand Fast Lights Out Remarks About Kings Might and Right The Price of Peace Storm-Music The Bells of Malines Jeanne d'Arc Returns The Name of France America's Prosperity The Glory of Ships Mare Liberum "Liberty Enlightening the World" The Oxford Thrushes Homeward Bound The Winds of War-News Righteous Wrath The Peaceful Warrior From Glory Unto Glory Britain, France, America The Red Cross Easter Road America's Welcome Home The Surrender of the German Fleet Golden Stars In the Blue Heaven A Shrine in the Pantheon IN PRAISE OF POETS Mother Earth Milton Wordsworth Keats 9 Shelley Robert Browning Tennyson "In Memoriam" Victor Hugo Longfellow Thomas Bailey Aldrich Edmund Clarence Stedman To James Whitcomb Riley Richard Watson Gilder The Valley of Vain Verses MUSIC Music Master of Music The Pipes o' Pan To a Young Girl Singing The Old Flute The First Bird o' Spring THE HOUSE OF RIMMON A DRAMA IN FOUR ACTS The House of Rimmon Dramatis Personæ APPENDIX CARMINA FESTIVA The Little-Neck Clam A Fairy Tale The Ballad of the Solemn Ass A Ballad of Santa Claus 10 Ars Agricolaris Angler's Fireside Song How Spring Comes to Shasta Jim A Bunch of Trout-Flies Index of First Lines SONGS OUT OF DOORS EARLY VERSES THE AFTER-ECHO How long the echoes love to play Around the shore of silence, as a wave Retreating circles down the sand! One after one, with sweet delay, The mellow sounds that cliff and island gave, Have lingered in the crescent bay, Until, by lightest breezes fanned, They float far off beyond the dying day And leave it still as death. But hark,-- Another singing breath Comes from the edge of dark; A note as clear and slow As falls from some enchanted bell, Or spirit, passing from the world below, That whispers back, Farewell. So in the heart, When, fading slowly down the past, Fond memories depart, And each that leaves it seems the last; Long after all the rest are flown, 11 Returns a solitary tone,-- The after-echo of departed years,-- And touches all the soul to tears. 1871. DULCIORA A tear that trembles for a little while Upon the trembling eyelid, till the world Wavers within its circle like a dream, Holds more of meaning in its narrow orb Than all the distant landscape that it blurs. A smile that hovers round a mouth beloved, Like the faint pulsing of the Northern Light, And grows in silence to an amber dawn Born in the sweetest depths of trustful eyes, Is dearer to the soul than sun or star. A joy that falls into the hollow heart From some far-lifted height of love unseen, Unknown, makes a more perfect melody Than hidden brooks that murmur in the dusk, Or fall athwart the cliff with wavering gleam. Ah, not for their own sake are earth and sky And the fair ministries of Nature dear, But as they set themselves unto the tune That fills our life; as light mysterious Flows from within and glorifies the world. For so a common wayside blossom, touched With tender thought, assumes a grace more sweet Than crowns the royal lily of the South; And so a well-remembered perfume seems 12 The breath of one who breathes in Paradise. 1872. THREE ALPINE SONNETS I THE GLACIER At dawn in silence moves the mighty stream, The silver-crested waves no murmur make; But far away the avalanches wake The rumbling echoes, dull as in a dream; Their momentary thunders, dying, seem To fall into the stillness, flake by flake, And leave the hollow air with naught to break The frozen spell of solitude supreme. At noon unnumbered rills begin to spring Beneath the burning sun, and all the walls Of all the ocean-blue crevasses ring With liquid lyrics of their waterfalls; As if a poet's heart had felt the glow Of sovereign love, and song began to flow. Zermatt, 1872. II THE SNOW-FIELD White Death had laid his pall upon the plain, And crowned the mountain-peaks like monarchs dead; The vault of heaven was glaring overhead With pitiless light that filled my eyes with pain; 13 And while I vainly longed, and looked in vain For sign or trace of life, my spirit said, "Shall any living thing that dares to tread This royal lair of Death escape again?" But even then I saw before my feet A line of pointed footprints in the snow: Some roving chamois, but an hour ago, Had passed this way along his journey fleet, And left a message from a friend unknown To cheer my pilgrim-heart, no more alone. Zermatt, 1872. III MOVING BELLS I love the hour that comes, with dusky hair And dewy feet, along the Alpine dells, To lead the cattle forth. A thousand bells Go chiming after her across the fair And flowery uplands, while the rosy flare Of sunset on the snowy mountain dwells, And valleys darken, and the drowsy spells Of peace are woven through the purple air.