(Philadelphia, Pa.)
South Street is not beautiful,
But the songs of people there
Hold the beauty of the jungle,
And the fervidness of prayer.
South Street has no mansions,
But the hands of South Street men
Built pyramids along the Nile
That Time has failed to rend.
South Street is America,
Breast of the foster mother
Where a thousand ill-kept children
Vie for suck, with one another.
After all and after all
When the song is sung
And swallowed up in silence
It were more real unsung....
After all and after all
When the lips have stirred
Such a little of the thought
Is transmuted in the word....
Suffer not my ears with hearing
Suffer not your thoughts with speech.
Let us feel into our meaning
And thus know the all of each.
Drowsy the noonday air,
Under the trees the still shadow
Like a fugitive fragment of night
Seeks shelter from the sun.
The bird has ceased singing,
The beggar unable to bear
The wealth of the sun
Spreads his torn garment,
To find peace in
The benign shadow of sleep.
Ah, lone soul like him,
I spread this rag of my song.
Under the tree of life
Over which blazes the sun of fate.
The calm of its shadow
Protects me, but where my peace?
A bruised heart,
A wounded soul,
A broken lute,
That is all!
A sad evening,
And a lone star,
Then song reddens--
Sets life's forest afire!
Many a bard
Sang many a song;
Many a dreamer
Dreamt many a dream;
Many a smile
Cast many a beam;
Many a lover
Loved, eternal, long.
But no life
Lived like his;
None sang
Sweet like him;
None loved
Love like him;
No love
True as his.
Star of our dream,
Flower of our song;
Carry her tenderly,
Carry her on.
Light of our life,
Soul of our love;
On the wings of air,
Bear her above.
Undying light,
Unsetting star,
Flower of immortality,
Heart of our love.
With the breath of perfume,
Warm and rare,
Bear her joyously,
Bear her fair.
The sun glints the waves with silver;
The gull, a white butterfly of desire;
The barque, a fancy of some intoxicated singer.
The brown islets, lost souls from the world of song;
The wind, an ever-sounding, unseen gong,
Telling of the worship of the sun, the sea and the storm.
Blue, brown, silver, song, sound and storm;
Dreams of a dying hour, shadow of a morn
That we have seen mirrored in the heart of song.
Soul: There is no stronger thing than song;
In sun and rain and leafy trees
It wafts the timid soul along
On crested waves of melodies.
Body: But leaves the body bare to feed
Its hunger with its very need.
Soul: Although the frenzied belly writhes,
Yet render up in song your tithes;
Song is the weakling’s oaken rod,
His Jacob’s ladder dropped from God.
Body: Song is not drink; song is not meat,
Nor strong, thick shoes for naked feet.
Soul: Who sings by unseen hands is fed
With honeyed milk and warm, white bread;
His ways in pastures green are led,
And perfumed oil illumes his head;
Death clogged this flute
At its highest note;
Song sleeps here mute
In this breathless throat.
Now the dead past seems vividly alive,
And in this shining moment I can trace,
Down through the vista of the vanished years,
Your faun-like form, your fond elusive face.
And suddenly some secret spring’s released,
And unawares a riddle is revealed,
And I can read like large, black-lettered print,
What seemed before a thing forever sealed.
I know the magic word, the graceful thought,
The song that fills me in my lucid hours,
The spirit’s wine that thrills my body through,
And makes me music-drunk, are yours, all yours.
I cannot praise, for you have passed from praise,
I have no tinted thoughts to paint you true;
But I can feel and I can write the word;
The best of me is but the least of you.
Gather the stars if you wish it so.
Gather the songs and keep them.
Gather the faces of women.
Gather for keeping years and years.
And then . . .
Loosen your hands, let go and say good-by.
Let the stars and songs go.
Let the faces and years go.
Loosen your hands and say good-by.
The sea-wash never ends.
The sea-wash repeats, repeats.
Only old songs? Is that all the sea knows?
Only the old strong songs?
Is that all?
The sea-wash repeats, repeats.