Lyrics of Life. Florence Earle Coates
other versions of this work, see Leaders of Men.
LEADERS OF MEN
When they are dead, we heap the laurels high
Above them where, indifferent, they lie:
We join their deeds to unaccustomed praise,
And crown with garlands of immortal bays
Whom, living, we but thought to crucify.
As mountains seem less glorious viewed too nigh,
So, often, do the great whom we decry
Gigantic loom to our astonished gaze—
When they are dead;
For, shamed by largeness, littlenesses die;
And partisan and narrow hates put by,
We shrine our heroes for the future days;
And to atone our ignorant delays
With fond and emulous devotion try—
When they are dead!
helen keller with a rose
For other versions of this work, see Helen Keller with a Rose.
HELEN KELLER WITH A ROSE
Others may see thee; I behold thee not;
Yet most I think thee, beauteous blossom, mine: For I, who walk in shade, like Proserpine— Things once too briefly looked on, long forgot— Seem by some tender miracle divine, When breathing thee, apart, To hold the rapturous summer warm within my heart.
We understand each other, thou and I!
Thy velvet petals laid against my cheek,
Thou feelest all the voiceless things I speak,
And to my yearning makest mute reply:
Yet a more special good of thee I seek,
For God who made—oh, kind!—
Beauty for one and all, gave fragrance for the blind!
leave-taking
For other versions of this work, see Leave-Taking (Coates).
LEAVE-TAKING
Though hence I go—though with the fading day
I seem to fade away—
Like to a primrose which beguiling Spring,
Too early fanning with perfumèd wing,
Tempts, only to betray:
Though soon I sleep—yet sorrow not, nor fear
That you shall lose me, dear!
For not one cherished memory—
One single yearning of your heart for me,
Shall fail to bring me near!
How strange could death divide who, living, share
All happiness and care!
Still as you gaze, bereft of your desire,
On the dull embers of your lonely fire,
You shall behold me there,
And though through hiemal glooms you sometimes learn
To doubt, nor hope discern—
Yet when the timid firstling buds awake,
And birds come back and sing, your heart to break—
Always, I shall return!
vestal
For other versions of this work, see Vestal.
VESTAL
She dwelt apart, as one whom love passed by,
Yet in her heart love glowed with steadfast beam;
And as the moonlight on a wintry stream
With paly radiance doth glorify
All barren things that in its circle lie,
So, from within, love shed so fair a gleam
About her, that it made her desert seem
A paradise, abloom immortally.
Some rashly pitied her; but, to atone,
If one perchance gazed long upon her face,
He grew to feel himself more strangely lone—
Love lent her look such amplitude of grace;
Yet who that would have made that love his own
Aught worthy had to offer in its place?
the house of pain
For other versions of this work, see The House of Pain.
THE HOUSE OF PAIN
Unto the Prison House of Pain none willingly repair—
The bravest who an entrance gain
Reluctant linger there—
For Pleasure, passing by that door, stays not to cheer the sight,
And Sympathy but muffles sound and banishes the light.
Yet in the Prison House of Pain things full of beauty blow—
Like Christmas-roses, which attain
Perfection 'mid the snow—
Love, entering, in his mild warmth the darkest shadows melt,
And often, where the hush is deep, the waft of wings is felt.
Ah, me! the Prison House of Pain!—what lessons there are bought!—
Lessons of a sublimer strain
Than any elsewhere taught—
Amid its loneliness and gloom, grave meanings grow more clear,
For to no earthly dwelling-place seems God so strangely near!
Конец