But the mother needs to be better;

She with thin form presently dressed in black;

By day her meals untouch'd, then at night fitfully sleeping, often

waking,

In the midnight waking, weeping, longing with one deep longing, O that she might withdraw unnoticed, silent from life escape and withdraw,

To follow, to seek, to be with her dear dead son.

DAREST THOU NOW, O SOUL

Darest thou now, O Soul,

Walk out with me toward the Unknown Region,

Where neither ground is for the feet, nor any path to follow?

No map there, nor guide,

Nor voice sounding, nor touch of human hand,

Nor face with blooming flesh, nor lips, nor eyes, are in that land.

I know it not, O Soul!

Nor dost thou, all is a blank before us;

All waits undreamed of in that region, that inaccessible land.

Till, when the ties loosen,

All but the ties eternal, Time and Space,

Nor darkness, gravitation, sense, nor any bounds bound us.

Then we burst forth, we float,

In Time and Space, O Soul! prepared for them,

Equal, equipped at last, (O joy! O fruit of all!) them to fulfil,

O Soul!

WHEN LILACS LAST IN THE DOOR-YARD BLOOM'D

SELECTIONS

I

When lilacs last in the door-yard bloom'd,

And the great star early droop'd in the western sky in the night,
I mourn'd — and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.

O ever-returning spring! trinity sure to me you bring;
Lilac blooming perennial, and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love.

O powerful, western, fallen star!

II

O shades of night! O moody, tearful night!

O great star disappear'd! O the black murk that hides the star! O cruel hands that hold me powerless! O helpless soul of me! O harsh surrounding cloud, that will not free my soul!

III

In the door-yard fronting an old farmhouse, near the whitewash'd palings,

Stands the lilac bush, tall-growing, with heart-shaped leaves of

rich green,

With many a pointed blossom, rising, delicate, with the perfume strong I love,

With every leaf a miracle... and from this bush in the door-yard, With delicate-color'd blossoms, and heart-shaped leaves of rich

green,

A sprig, with its flower, I break.

IV

In the swamp, in secluded recesses,

A shy and hidden bird is warbling a song.

Solitary, the thrush,

The hermit, withdrawn to himself, avoiding the settlements,
Sings by himself a song.

Song of the bleeding throat!

Death's outlet song of life — (for well, dear brother, I know,
If thou wast not gifted to sing, thou would'st surely die.)

V

Over the breast of the spring, the land, amid cities,

Amid lanes, and through old woods, (where lately the violets peep'd from the ground, spotting the gray debris ;)

Amid the grass in the fields each side of the lanes passing the endless grass;

Passing the yellow-speared wheat, every grain from its shroud in the dark-brown fields uprising;

Passing the apple-tree blows of white and pink in the orchards;
Carrying a corpse to where it shall rest in the grave,
Night and day journeys a coffin.

VI

Coffin that passes through lanes and streets,

Through day and night with the great cloud darkening the land, With the pomp of the in-looped flags, with the cities draped in

black,

With the show of the States themselves as of crape-veil'd women standing,

With processions long and winding and the flambeaus of the night, With the countless torches lit, with the silent sea of faces and the unbared heads,

With the waiting depot, the arriving coffin, and the sombre faces, With dirges through the night, with the thousand voices rising strong and solemn ;

With all the mournful voices of the dirges pour'd around the

coffin,

The dim-lit churches and the shuddering organs where amid

these you journey,

With the tolling, tolling bells' perpetual clang,

Here, coffin that slowly passes,

I give you my sprig of lilac.

Sing on, there in the swamp!

IX

O singer bashful and tender, I hear your notes, I hear your call,
I hear, I come presently, I understand you,

But a moment I linger, for the lustrous star has detained me;
The star my departing comrade holds and detains me.

X

O how shall I warble myself for the dead one there I loved?
And how shall I deck my soul for the large sweet soul that has gone?
And what shall my perfume be for the grave of him I love?

Sea-winds blown from east and west,

Blown from the Eastern sea and blown from the Western sea, till there on the prairies meeting,

These, and with these, and the breath of my chant,

I perfume the grave of him I love.

XIII

Sing on! sing on, you gray-brown bird!
Sing from the swamps, the recesses

bushes;

pour your chant from the

Limitless out of the dusk, out of the cedars and pines.

Sing on, dearest brother-warble your reedy song;

Loud human song, with voice of uttermost woe.

O liquid, and free, and tender!

O wild and loose to my soul! O wondrous singer!

You only I hear . . . yet the star holds me, (but will soon depart) Yet the lilac, with mastering odor, holds me.

To the tally of my soul,

XVII

Loud and strong kept up the gray-brown bird

With pure, deliberate notes, spreading, filling the night.

Loud in the pines and cedars dim,

Clear in the freshness moist and the swamp-perfume;
And I with my comrades there in the night.

While my sight that was bound in my eyes unclosed,
As to long panoramas of visions.

XVIII

I saw askant the armies;

I saw as in noiseless dreams hundreds of battle-flags,
Borne through the smoke of the battles and pierced with missiles,
I saw them,

And carried hither and yon through the smoke, and torn and bloody;

And at last but a few shreds left on the staffs (and all in silence,) And the staffs all splintered and broken.

I saw battle-corpses, myriads of them,

And the white skeletons of young men, I saw them;

I saw the debris and debris of all the dead soldiers of the war.

But I saw they were not as was thought,

They themselves were fully at rest, they suffer'd not;

The living remain'd and suffer'd, the mother suffer'd,

And the wife and the child, and the musing comrade suffer'd,
And the armies that remained suffer'd.

XIX

Passing the visions, passing the night;

Passing, unloosing the hold of my comrades' hands;

Passing the song of the hermit bird and the tallying song of my soul,

Victorious song, death's outlet song, yet varying ever-altering song, As low and wailing, yet clear the notes, rising and falling, flooding

the night,

Sadly sinking and fainting, as warning and warning, and yet again bursting with joy,