Helen Hunt Jackson

What freeman knoweth freedom? Never he Whose father's father through long lives have reigned O'er kingdoms which mere heritage attained. Though from his youth to age he roam as free As winds, he dreams not freedom's ecstacy. But he whose birth was in a nation chained For centuries; where every breath was drained From breasts of slaves which knew not there could be Such thing as freedom,--he beholds the light Burst, dazzling; though the glory blind his sight He knows the joy. Fools laugh because he reels And weilds confusedly his infant will; The wise man watching with a heart that feels Says: "Cure for freedom's harms is freedom still."

The Fir-Tree looked on stars, but loved the Brook! "O silver-voiced! if thou wouldst wait, My love can bravely woo." All smiles forsook The brook's white face. "Too late! Too late! I go to wed the sea. I know not if my love would curse or bless thee. I may not, dare not, tarry to caress thee, Oh, do not follow me!

The Fir-Tree moaned and moaned till spring; Then laughed in manic joy to feel Early one day, the woodsmen of the King Sign him with a sign of burning steel, The first to fall. "Now flee Thy swiftest, Brook! Thy love may curse or bless me, I care not, if but once thou dost caress me, O Brook, I follow thee!

All torn and bruised with mark of adze and chain, Hurled down the dizzy slide of sand, Tossed by great waves in ecstsy of pain, And rudely thrown at last to land, The Fir-Tree heard: "Oh, see With what fierce love it is I must caress thee! I warned thee I might curse, and never bless thee, Why didst thou follow me?

All stately set with spar and brace and rope, The Fir-Tree stood and sailed and sailed. In wildest storm when all the ship lost hope, The Fir-Tree never shook nor quailed, Nor ceased from saying, "Free Art thou, O Brook! But once thou hast caressed me; For life, for death, thy love has cursed or blessed me; Behold, I follow thee!"

Lost in a night, and no man left to tell, Crushed in the giant iceberg's play, The ship went down without a song, a knell. Still drifts the Fir-Tree night and day, Still moans along the sea A voice: "O Fir-Tree! thus must I possess thee; Eternally, brave love, will I caress thee, Dead for the love of me!"

Some flowers are withered and some joys have died; The garden reeks with an East Indian scent From beds where gillyflowers stand weak and spent; The white heat pales the skies from side to side; But in still lakes and rivers, cool, content, Like starry blooms on a new firmament, White lilies float and regally abide. In vain the cruel skies their hot rays shed; The lily does not feel their brazen glare. In vain the pallid clouds refuse to share Their dews, the lily feels no thirst, no dread. Unharmed she lifts her queenly face and head; She drinks of living waters and keeps fair.

O month whose promise and fulfilment blend, And burst in one! it seems the earth can store In all her roomy house no treasure more; Of all her wealth no farthing have to spend On fruit, when once this stintless flowering end. And yet no tiniest flower shall fall before It hath made ready at its hidden core Its tithe of seed, which we may count and tend Till harvest. Joy of blossomed love, for thee Seems it no fairer thing can yet have birth? No room is left for deeper ecstacy? Watch well if seeds grow strong, to scatter free Germs for thy future summers on the earth. A joy which is but joy soon comes to dearth.

O Month when they who love must love and wed! Were one to go to worlds where May is naught, And seek to tell the memories he had brought From earth of thee, what were most fitly said? I know not if the rosy showers shed From apple-boughs, or if the soft green wrought In fields, or if the robin's call be fraught The most with thy delight. Perhaps they read Thee best who in the ancient time did say Thou wert the sacred month unto the old: No blossom blooms upon thy brightest day So subtly sweet as memories which unfold In aged hearts which in thy sunshine lie, To sun themselves once more before they die.

I dreamed that I ws dead and crossed the heavens,-- Heavens after heavens with burning feet and swift,-- And cried: "O God, where art Thou?" I left one On earth, whose burden I would pray Thee lift."

I was so dead I wondered at no thing,-- Not even that the angels slowly turned Their faces, speechless, as I hurried by (Beneath my feet the golden pavements burned);

Nor, at the first, that I could not find God, Because the heavens stretched endlessly like space. At last a terror siezed my very soul; I seemed alone in all the crowded place.

Then, sudden, one compassionate cried out, Though like the rest his face from me he turned, As I were one no angel might regard (Beneath my feet the golden pavements burned):

"No moew in heaven than earth will he find God Who does not know his loving mercy swift But waits the moment consummate and ripe, Each burden, from each human soul to lift."

Though I was dead, I died again for shame; Lonely, to flee from heaven again I turned; The ranks of angels looked away from me (Beneath my feet the golden pavements burned).

This is the treacherous month when autumn days With summer's voice come bearing summer's gifts. Beguiled, the pale down-trodden aster lifts Her head and blooms again. The soft, warm haze Makes moist once more the sere and dusty ways, And, creeping through where dead leaves lie in drifts, The violet returns. Snow noiseless sifts Ere night, an icy shroud, which morning's rays Willidly shine upon and slowly melt, Too late to bid the violet live again. The treachery, at last, too late, is plain; Bare are the places where the sweet flowers dwelt. What joy sufficient hath November felt? What profit from the violet's day of pain?

No days such honored days as these! While yet Fair Aphrodite reigned, men seeking wide For some fair thing which should forever bide On earth, her beauteous memory to set In fitting frame that no age could forget, Her name in lovely April's name did hide, And leave it there, eternally allied To all the fairest flowers Spring did beget. And when fair Aphrodite passed from earth, Her shrines forgotten and her feasts of mirth, A holier symbol still in seal and sign, Sweet April took, of kingdom most divine, When Christ ascended, in the time of birth Of spring anemones, in Palestine.