A Saxon Epitaph
The earth builds on the earth
Castles and towers;
The earth saith of the earth:
All shall be ours.
Yea, though they plan and reap
The rye and the corn,
Lo, they were bond to Sleep
Ere they were born.
Yea, though the blind earth sows
For the fruit and the sheaf,
They shall harvest the leaf of the rose
And the dust of the leaf.
Pride of the sword and power
Are theirs at their need
Who shall rule but the root of the flower
The fall of the seed.
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poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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The Gardener's Boy
ALL day I have fed on lilied thoughts of her,'
The gardener's boy sang in Gethsemane.
'She is quick, her garments make a lovely stir,
Like the wind going in an almond tree.
She is young, she hath doves' eyes, and like the vine
Her hands enclose me,–hers as she is mine.
'She shall feed among the lilies where I am,
Learning their silver names. When evening grows,
One bower shall hold me and my love, my lamb.
Which shall I clasp,' he sang, 'her or the rose?'
When the palm shadow barred the juniper
He lay at last to sleep and dream of her.
He saw not those who came when night was deep
Up from the city, walking hastily.
One seemed a strong man wan for fear and sleep.
One bore a lantern. One moved stumblingly.
The gardener's boy dreamed on the sunburned sod,
Smiling beside the agony of God.
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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In The Gardens Of Shushan
BE pitiful ! Her lips have touched this cool
Clear stream that sets the long green leaves astir.
The very doves that dream beside the pool
Sang their soft notes to her.
For her these doors that claim the amorous south,
Bound in red bronze and stayed with cedar-wood.
And here the bees sought honey from her mouth,
So like a flower she stood.
For her the globed pomegranates grew, and all
Sweet savoury fruits rose perfect from their flower.
Here has her soul known silence and the fall
Of each enchanted hour.
Under her feet all beauty was laid low,
In her deep eyes all beauty was made clear.
When the king called her through the evening glow,
'O Vashti, I am here !'
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poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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The Fortune Seeker
HOLLYHOCKS slant in the wind,
Gallantly blowing,
Crinkled and purfled and lined,
Thank God for their growing.
Their burden is only of bees,
Banded and brown,
But she, O, she's
The worth of my world on her head for a crown.
How can she step it so freely, so lightly,
Her head like a star on a stem showing whitely,
Mow can she carry her
Wealth with that innocent air?
I'm going to marry her, marry her, marry her,
Just for the wealth of her hair.
Larkspurs as deep as a pool,
Lilies like ladies,
Silvered and silked where the cool
Elder tree shade is,
These are the queens of the sun,
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poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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Mary Tired
Through the starred Judean night
She went, in travail of the Light,
With the earliest hush she saw
God beside her in the straw.
One poor taper glimmered clear,
Drowsing Joseph nodded near,
All the glooms were rosed with wings.
She that knew the Spirit's kiss
Wearied of the bright abyss.
She was tired of heavenly things.
There between the day and night
These she counted for delight:
Baby kids that butted hard
In the shadowy stable yard;
Silken doves that dipped and preened
Where the crumbling well-curb greened;
Sparrows in the vine, and small
Sapphired flies upon the wall,
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poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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Merlin's Isle
O, I went down to Merlin's Isle,
And when that I had found it,
I kneeled me down a little while
And praised the peace that bound it.
There were no seas around it,
But the full tide of turf in flood
To the rim of the berried hawthorn wood,
And a dew-pond where the dear stars stood
Too deep for me to sound it.
O, I went down to Merlin's Isle
And there I soon did learn-a,
The winds they did implore me,
How sweet two beech-brown eyes may smile
Among the maiden fern-a.
My poor heart took a turn-a.
In a warm wind the whitebeam foam
Ran quick along the silvering loam,
And I was young and far from home,
As you may well discern-a
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poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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Wanderlied
O, WEST of all the westward roads that woo ye to their winding,
O, south of all the southward ways that call ye to the sea,
There's a little lonely garden that would pay ye for the finding,
With a fairy-ring within it and an old thorn tree.
O, there upon the brink of morn the thrushes would be calling,
And the little lilting linnets, sure they'd wake me from the dead;
With the lime trees all in blossom and the soft leaf-shadows falling,
O, there I'd have a place at last to lay my head.
O, would I had a swallow's wings, for then I'd fly and find it;
O, would I had a swallow's heart, for then I'd love to roam !
With an orchard on the hillside and an old, old man to mind it,
O, there I'd lift my lodge at last and make my home.
O, there I'd see the tide come in along the whispering reaches,
O, there I'd lie and watch the sails go shining to the west.
And where the fir-wood follows on the wide unswerving beaches,
It's there I'd lay me down at last and take my rest.
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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Pieter Marinus
LORD, I have known all fruits of this thy world;
Like Solomon king, I have been fain of all,–
War, women, and wine,–but mine was spirit of Nantes.
And now, O Lord, I'm old and fain for Thee.
But, Lord, my soul's so grimed and weather-worn,
So warped and wrung with all iniquities,
Piracies, brawls, and cheated revenues,
There's not a saint but would look twice at it.
So, when my time comes, send no angels down
With lutes, and harps, and foreign instruments,
To pipe old Pieter's spirit up to heaven
Past his tall namesake sturdy at his post.
But let me lie awhile in these Thy seas.
Let the soft Gulf Stream and the long South Drift,
And the swift tides that rim the Labrador,
Beat on my soul and wash it clean again.
And when Thy waves have smoothed me of my sins,
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poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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On Lac Sainte Ireneé
ON Lac Sainte Ireneé the morn
Lay rimmed with pine and roped with mist.
The old moon hid her silver horn
In shadow that the sun had kissed.
One went by like a wandering soul,
And followed ever,
By reed and river,
The silent canoe of the lake patrol.
On Lac Sainte Ireneé the noon
Lay wolf-like waiting by her hills.
No voice was heard but the sad loon
And the wild-throated whip-poor-wills.
But one went by on the bitter flaw,
And followed ever,
By rapid and river,
The swift canoe of the white man's law.
On Lac Sainte Ireneé the moose
Broke from his balsams, breathing hot.
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poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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The Pool
COME with me, follow me, swift as a moth,
Ere the wood-doves waken.
Lift the long leaves and look down, look down
Where the light is shaken,
Amber and brown,
On the woven ivory roots of the reed,
On a floating flower and a weft of weed
And a feather of froth.
Here in the night all wonders are,
Lapped in the lift of the ripple's swing,–
A silver shell and a shaken star,
And a white moth's wing.
Here the young moon when the mists unclose
Swims like the bud of a golden rose.
I would live like an elf where the wild grapes cling,
I would chase the thrush
From the red rose-berries.
All the day long I would laugh and swing
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poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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