Books: Poems of Purpose
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Ella Wheeler Wilcox >> Poems of Purpose
Transcribed from the 1919 Gay and Hancock edition by David Price, email
ccx074@coventry.ac.uk
POEMS OF PURPOSE
Contents:
A Good Sport
A Son Speaks
The Younger Born
Happiness
Seeking for Happiness
The Island of Endless Play
The River of Sleep
The Things that Count
Limitless
What They Saw
The Convention
Protest
A Bachelor to a Married Flirt
The Superwoman
Certitude
Compassion
Love
Three Souls
When Love is Lost
Occupation
The Valley of Fear
What would it be?
America
War Mothers
A Holiday
The Undertone
Gypsying
Song of the Road
The Faith we Need
The Price he Paid
Divorced
The Revealing Angels
The Well-born
Sisters of Mine
Answer
The Graduates
The Silent Tragedy
The Trinity
The Unwed Mother to the Wife
Father and Son
Husks
Meditations
The Traveller
What Have You Done?
A GOOD SPORT
I was a little lad, and the older boys called to me from the pier:
They called to me: 'Be a sport: be a sport! Leap in and swim!'
I leaped in and swam, though I had never been taught a stroke.
Then I was made a hero, and they all shouted:
'Well done! Well done,
Brave boy, you are a sport, a good sport!'
And I was very glad.
But now I wish I had learned to swim the right way,
Or had never learned at all.
Now I regret that day,
For it led to my fall.
I was a youth, and I heard the older men talking of the road to wealth;
They talked of bulls and bears, of buying on margins,
And they said, 'Be a sport, my boy, plunge in and win or lose it all!
It is the only way to fortune.'
So I plunged in and won; and the older men patted me on the back,
And they said, 'You are a sport, my boy, a good sport!'
And I was very glad.
But now I wish I had lost all I ventured on that day -
Yes, wish I had lost it all.
For it was the wrong way,
And pushed me to my fall.
I was a young man, and the gay world called me to come;
Gay women and gay men called to me, crying:
'Be a sport; be a good sport!
Fill our glasses and let us fill yours.
We are young but once; let us dance and sing,
And drive the dull hours of night until they stand at bay
Against the shining bayonets of day.'
So I filled my glass, and I filled their glasses, over and over again,
And I sang and danced and drank, and drank and danced and sang,
And I heard them cry, 'He is a sport, a good sport!'
As they held their glasses out to be filled again.
And I was very glad.
Oh the madness of youth and song and dance and wine,
Of woman's eyes and lips, when the night dies in the arms of dawn!
And now I wish I had not gone that way.
Now I wish I had not heard them say,
'He is a sport, a good sport!'
For I am old who should be young.
The splendid vigour of my youth I flung
Under the feet of a mad, unthinking throng.
My strength went out with wine and dance and song;
Unto the winds of earth I tossed like chaff,
With idle jest and laugh,
The pride of splendid manhood, all its wealth
Of unused power and health -
Its dream of looking into some pure girl's eyes
And finding there its earthly paradise -
Its hope of virile children free from blight -
Its thoughts of climbing to some noble height
Of great achievement--all these gifts divine
I cast away for song and dance and wine.
Oh, I have been a sport, a good sport;
But I am very sad.
A SON SPEAKS
Mother, sit down, for I have much to say
Anent this widespread ever-growing theme
Of woman and her virtues and her rights.
I left you for the large, loud world of men,
When I had lived one little score of years.
I judged all women by you, and my heart
Was filled with high esteem and reverence
For your angelic sex; and for the wives,
The sisters, daughters, mothers of my friends
I held but holy thoughts. To fallen stars
(Of whom you told me in our last sweet talk,
Warning me of the dangers in my path)
I gave wide pity as you bade me to,
Saying their sins harked back to my base sex.
Now listen, mother mine: Ten years have passed
Since that clean-minded and pure-bodied youth,
Thinking to write his name upon the stars,
Went from your presence. He returns to you
Fallen from his altitude of thought,
Hiding deep scars of sins upon his soul,
His fair illusions shattered and destroyed.
And would you know the story of his fall?
He sat beside a good man's honoured wife
At her own table. She was beautiful
As woods in early autumn. Full of soft
And subtle witcheries of voice and look -
His senior, both in knowledge and in years.
The boyish admiration of his glance
Was white as April sunlight when it falls
Upon a blooming tree, until she leaned
So close her rounded body sent quick thrills
Along his nerves. He thought it accident,
And moved a little; soon she leaned again.
The half-hid beauties of her heaving breast
Rising and falling under scented lace,
The teasing tendrils of her fragrant hair,
With intermittent touches on his cheek,
Changed the boy's interest to a man's desire.
She saw that first young madness in his eyes
And smiled and fanned the flame. That was his fall;
And as some mangled fly may crawl away
And leave his wings behind him in the web,
So were his wings of faith in womanhood
Left in the meshes of her sensuous net.
The youth, forced into sudden manhood, went
Seeking the lost ideal of his dreams.
He met, in churches and in drawing-rooms,
Women who wore the mask of innocence
And basked in public favour, yet who seemed
To find their pleasure playing with men's hearts,
As children play with loaded guns. He heard
(Until the tale fell dull upon his ears)
The unsolicited complaints of wives
And mothers all unsatisfied with life,
While crowned with every blessing earth can give
Longing for God knows what to bring content,
And openly or with appealing look
Asking for sympathy. (The first blind step
That leads from wifely honour down to shame,
Is ofttimes hid with flowers of sympathy.)
He saw proud women who would flush and pale
With sense of outraged modesty if one
Spoke of the ancient sin before them, bare
To all men's sight, or flimsily conceal
By veils that bid adventurous eyes proceed,
Charms meant alone for lover and for child.
He saw chaste virgins tempt and tantalise,
Lure and deny, invite--and then refuse,
And drive men forth half crazed to wantons' arms.
Mother, you taught me there were but two kinds
Of women in the world--the good and bad.
But you have been too sheltered in the safe,
Old-fashioned sweetness of your quiet life,
To know how women of these modern days
Make licence of their new-found liberty.
Why, I have been more tempted and more shocked
By belles and beauties in the social whirl,
By trusted wives and mothers in their homes,
Than by the women of the underworld
Who sell their favours. Do you think me mad?
No, mother; I am sane, but very sad.
I miss my boyhood's faith in woman's worth -
Torn from my heart, by 'good folks' of the earth.
THE YOUNGER BORN
The modern English-speaking young girl is the astonishment of the world and
the despair of the older generation. Nothing like her has ever been seen
or heard before. Alike in drawing-rooms and the amusement places of the
people, she defies conventions in dress, speech, and conduct. She is bold,
yet not immoral. She is immodest, yet she is chaste. She has no ideals,
yet she is kind and generous. She is an anomaly and a paradox.
We are the little daughters of Time and the World his wife,
We are not like the children, born in their younger life,
We are marred with our mother's follies and torn with our father's strife.
We are the little daughters of the modern world,
And Time, her spouse.
She has brought many children to our father's house
Before we came, when both our parents were content
With simple pleasures and with quiet homely ways.
Modest and mild
Were the fair daughters born to them in those fair days,
Modest and mild.
But Father Time grew restless and longed for a swifter pace,
And our mother pushed out beside him at the cost of her tender grace,
And life was no more living but just a headlong race.
And we are wild -
Yea, wild are we, the younger born of the World
Into life's vortex hurled.
With the milk of our mother's breast
We drank her own unrest,
And we learned our speech from Time
Who scoffs at the things sublime.
Time and the World have hurried so
They could not help their younger born to grow;
We only follow, follow where they go.
They left their high ideals behind them as they ran;
There was but one goal, pleasure, for Woman or for Man,
And they robbed the nights of slumber to lengthen the days' brief span.
We are the demi-virgins of the modern day;
All evil on the earth is known to us in thought,
But yet we do it not.
We bare our beauteous bodies to the gaze of men,
We lure them, tempt them, lead them on, and then
Lightly we turn away.
By strong compelling passion we are never stirred;
To us it is a word -
A word much used when tragic tales are told;
We are the younger born, yet we are very old
In understanding, and our knowledge makes us bold.
Boldly we look at life,
Loving its stress and strife,
And hating all conventions that may mean restraint,
Yet shunning sin's black taint.
We know wine's taste;
And the young-maiden bloom and sweetness of our lips
Is often in eclipse
Under the brown weed's stain.
Yet we are chaste;
We have no large capacity for joy or pain,
But an insatiable appetite for pleasure.
We have no use for leisure
And never learned the meaning of that word 'repose.'
Life as it goes
Must spell excitement for us, be the cost what may.
Speeding along the way,
We ofttimes pause to do some generous little deed,
And fill the cup of need;
For we are kind at heart,
Though with less heart than head,
Unmoral, not immoral, when the worst is said;
We are the product of the modern day.
We are the little daughters of Time and the World his wife,
We are not like the children, born in their younger life,
We are marred with our mother's follies and torn with our father's strife.
HAPPINESS
There are so many little things that make life beautiful.
I can recall a day in early youth when I was longing for happiness.
Toward the western hills I gazed, watching for its approach.
The hills lay between me and the setting sun, and over them led a highway.
When some traveller crossed the hill, always a fine grey dust rose
cloudless against the sky.
The traveller I could not distinguish, but the dust-cloud I could see.
And the dust-cloud seemed formed of hopes and possibilities--each speck an
embryo event.
At sunset, when the skies were fair, the dust-cloud grew radiant and shone
with visions.
The happiness for which I waited came not to me adown that western slope,
But now I can recall the cloud of golden dust, the sunset, and the highway
leading over the hill,
The wonderful hope and expectancy of my heart, the visions of youth in my
eyes; and I know this was happiness.
There are so many little things that make life beautiful.
I can recall another day when I rebelled at life's monotony.
Everywhere about me was the commonplace; and nothing seemed to happen.
Each day was like its yesterday, and to-morrow gave no promise of change.
My young heart rose rebellious in my breast; and I ran aimlessly into the
sunlight--the glowing sunlight of June.
I sent out a dumb cry to Fate, demanding larger joys and more delight.
I ran blindly into a field of blooming clover.
It was breast-high, and billowed about me like rose-red waves of a fragrant
sea.
The bees were singing above it; and their little brown bodies were loaded
with honey-dew, extracted from the clover blossoms.
The sun reeled in the heavens dizzy with its own splendour.
The day went into night, without bringing any new event to change my life.
But now I recall the field of blooming clover, and the honey-laden bees,
the glorious June sunlight, and the passion of youth in my heart; and I
know that was happiness.
There are so many little things that make life beautiful.
Yesterday a failure stared me in the face, where I had thought to welcome
proud success.
There was no radiant cloud of dust against the western sky, and no clover
field lying fragrant under mid-June suns,
Neither was youth with me any more.
But under the vines that clung against my walls, a flock of birds sought
shelter just at twilight;
And, standing at my casement, I could hear the twitter of their voices and
the soft, sweet flutter of their wings.
Then over me there fell a sense of peace and calm, and love for all created
things, and trust illimitable.
And that I knew was happiness.
There are so many little things to make life beautiful.
SEEKING FOR HAPPINESS
Seeking for happiness we must go slowly;
The road leads not down avenues of haste;
But often gently winds through by ways lowly,
Whose hidden pleasures are serene and chaste
Seeking for happiness we must take heed
Of simple joys that are not found in speed.
Eager for noon-time's large effulgent splendour,
Too oft we miss the beauty of the dawn,
Which tiptoes by us, evanescent, tender,
Its pure delights unrecognised till gone.
Seeking for happiness we needs must care
For all the little things that make life fair.
Dreaming of future pleasures and achievements
We must not let to-day starve at our door;
Nor wait till after losses and bereavements
Before we count the riches in our store.
Seeking for happiness we must prize this -
Not what will be, or was, but that which IS.
In simple pathways hand in hand with duty
(With faith and love, too, ever at her side),
May happiness be met in all her beauty
The while we search for her both far and wide.
Seeking for happiness we find the way
Doing the things we ought to do each day.
THE ISLAND OF ENDLESS PLAY
Said Willie to Tom, 'Let us hie away
To the wonderful Island of Endless Play.
It lies off the border of "No School Land,"
And abounds with pleasure, I understand.
There boys go swimming whenever they please
In a lovely river right under the trees.
And marbles are free, so you need not buy;
And kites of all sizes are ready to fly.
We sail down the Isthmus of Idle Delight -
We sail and we sail for a day and a night.
And then, if favoured by billows and breeze,
We land in the Harbour of Do-as-You-Please.
And there lies the Island of Endless Play,
With no one to say to us, Must, or Nay.
Books are not known in that land so fair,
Teachers are stoned if they set foot there.
Hurrah for the Island, so glad and free,
That is the country for you and me.'
So away went Willie and Tom together
On a pleasure boat, in the lazy weather,
And they sailed in the teeth of a friendly breeze
Right into the harbour of 'Do-as-You-Please.'
Where boats and tackle and marbles and kites
Were waiting them there in this Land of Delights.
They dwelt on the Island of Endless Play
For five long years; then one sad day
A strange, dark ship sailed up to the strand,
And 'Ho! for the voyage to Stupid Land,'
The captain cried, with a terrible noise,
As he seized the frightened and struggling boys
And threw them into the dark ship's hold;
And off and away sailed the captain bold.
They vainly begged him to let them out,
He answered only with scoff and shout.
'Boys that don't study or work,' said he,
'Must sail one day down the Ignorant Sea
To Stupid Land by the No-Book Strait,
With Captain Time on the Pitiless Fate.'
He let out the sails and away went the three
Over the waters of Ignorant Sea,
Out and away to Stupid Land;
And they live there yet, I understand.
And there's where every one goes, they say,
Who seeks the Island of Endless Play.
THE RIVER OF SLEEP
There are curious isles in the River of Sleep,
Curious isles without number.
We'll visit them all as we leisurely creep
Down the winding stream whose current is deep,
In our beautiful barge of Slumber.
The very first isle in this wonderful stream
Quite close to the shore is lying,
And after a supper of cakes and cream
We come to the Night-Mare-Isle with a scream,
And hurry away from it crying.
And next is the Island-of-Lullaby,
And every one there rejoices.
The winds are only a perfumed sigh,
And the birds that sing in the treetops try
To imitate Mothers' voices.
A little beyond is the Isle-of-Dreams;
Oh, that is the place to be straying.
Everything there is just as it seems;
Dolls are real and sunshine gleams,
And no one calls us from playing.
And then we come to the drollest isle,
And the funniest sounds come pouring
Down from its borderlands once in a while,
And we lean o'er our barge and listen and smile;
For that is the Isle-of-Snoring.
And the very last isle in the River of Sleep
Is the sunshiny Isle-of-Waking.
We see it first with our eyes a-peep,
And we give a yawn--then away we leap,
The barge of Slumber forsaking.
THE THINGS THAT COUNT
Now, dear, it isn't the bold things,
Great deeds of valour and might,
That count the most in the summing up of life at the end of the day.
But it is the doing of old things,
Small acts that are just and right;
And doing them over and over again, no matter what others say;
In smiling at fate, when you want to cry, and in keeping at work when you
want to play -
Dear, those are the things that count.
And, dear, it isn't the new ways
Where the wonder-seekers crowd
That lead us into the land of content, or help us to find our own.
But it is keeping to true ways,
Though the music is not so loud,
And there may be many a shadowed spot where we journey along alone;
In flinging a prayer at the face of fear, and in changing into a song a
groan -
Dear, these are the things that count.
My dear, it isn't the loud part
Of creeds that are pleasing to God,
Not the chant of a prayer, or the hum of a hymn, or a jubilant shout or
song.
But it is the beautiful proud part
Of walking with feet faith-shod;
And in loving, loving, loving through all, no matter how things go wrong;
In trusting ever, though dark the day, and in keeping your hope when the
way seems long -
Dear, these are the things that count.
LIMITLESS
When the motive is right and the will is strong
There are no limits to human power;
For that great Force back of us moves along
And takes us with it, in trial's hour.
And whatever the height you yearn to climb,
Though it never was trod by the foot of man,
And no matter how steep--I say you CAN,
If you will be patient--and use your time.
WHAT THEY SAW
Sad man, Sad man, tell me, pray,
What did you see to-day?
I saw the unloved and unhappy old, waiting for slow delinquent death to
come;
Pale little children toiling for the rich, in rooms where sunlight is
ashamed to go;
The awful almshouse, where the living dead rot slowly in their hideous open
graves.
And there were shameful things.
Soldiers and forts, and industries of death, and devil-ships, and loud-
winged devil-birds,
All bent on slaughter and destruction. These and yet more shameful things
mine eyes beheld:
Old men upon lascivious conquest bent, and young men living with no thought
of God,
And half-clothed women puffing at a weed, aping the vices of the
underworld,
Engrossed in shallow pleasures and intent on being barren wives.
These things I saw.
(How God must loathe His earth!)
Glad man, Glad man, tell me, pray.
What did you see to-day?
I saw an aged couple, in whose eyes
Shone that deep light of mingled love and faith,
Which makes the earth one room of paradise,
And leaves no sting in death.
I saw vast regiments of children pour,
Rank after rank, out of the schoolroom door
By Progress mobilised. They seemed to say:
'Let ignorance make way.
We are the heralds of a better day.'
I saw the college and the church that stood
For all things sane and good.
I saw God's helpers in the shop and slum
Blazing a path for health and hope to come,
And True Religion, from the grave of creeds,
Springing to meet man's needs.
I saw great Science reverently stand
And listen for a sound from Border-land,
No longer arrogant with unbelief -
Holding itself aloof -
But drawing near, and searching high and low
For that complete and all-convincing proof
Which shall permit its voice to comfort grief,
Saying, 'We know.'
I saw fair women in their radiance rise
And trample old traditions in the dust.
Looking in their clear eyes,
I seemed to hear these words as from the skies:
'He who would father our sweet children must
Be worthy of the trust.'
Against the rosy dawn, I saw unfurled
The banner of the race we usher in,
The supermen and women of the world,
Who make no code of sex to cover sin;
Before they till the soil of parenthood,
They look to it that seed and soil are good.
And I saw, too, that old, old sight, and best -
Pure mothers, with dear babies at the breast.
These things I saw.
(How God must love His earth!)
THE CONVENTION
From the Queen Bee mother, the mother Beast, and the mother Fowl in the
fen,
A call went up to the human world, to Woman, the mother of men.
The call said, 'Come: for we, the dumb, are given speech for a day,
And the things we have thought for a thousand years we are going at last to
say.'
Much they marvelled, these women of earth, at the strange and curious call,
And some of them laughed, and some of them sneered, but they answered it
one and all,
For they wanted to hear what never before was heard since the world began -
The spoken word of Beast and Bird, and the message it held for Man.
'A plea for shelter,' the woman said, 'or food in the wintry weathers,
Or a foolish request that we be dressed without their furs or feathers.
We will do what we can for the poor dumb things, but they must be
sensible.' Then
The meeting was called and a she-bear stood and voiced the thought of the
fen.
'Now this is the message we give to you' (it was thus the she-bear spake):
'You the creatures of homes and shrines, and we of the wold and brake,
We have no churches, we have no schools, and our minds you question and
doubt,
But we follow the laws which some Great Cause, alike for us all, laid out.
'We eat and we drink to live; we shun the things that poison and kill,
And we settle the problems of sex and birth by the law of the female will,
For never was one of us known by a male, or made to mother its kind,
Unless there went from our minds consent (or from what we call the mind).
'But you, the highest of all she-things, you gorge yourselves at your
feasts,
And you smoke and drink in a way we think would lower the standard of
beasts;
For a ring, a roof and a rag, you are bought by your males, to have and to
hold,
And you mate and you breed without nature's need, while your hearts and
your bodies are cold.
'All unwanted your offspring come, or you slay them before they are born;
And now the wild she-things of the earth have spoken and told their scorn.
We have no mind and we have no souls, maybe as you think--And still,
Never one of us ate or drank the things that poison and kill,
And never was one of us known by a male except by our wish and will.'
PROTEST
To sit in silence when we should protest
Makes cowards out of men. The human race
Has climbed on protest. Had no voice been raised
Against injustice, ignorance and lust
The Inquisition yet would serve the law
And guillotines decide our least disputes.
The few who dare must speak and speak again
To right the wrongs of many. Speech, thank God,
No vested power in this great day and land
Can gag or throttle; Press and voice may cry
Loud disapproval of existing ills,
May criticise oppression and condemn
The lawlessness of wealth-protecting laws
That let the children and child-bearers toil
To purchase ease for idle millionaires.
Therefore do I protest against the boast
Of independence in this mighty land.
Call no chain strong which holds one rusted link,
Call no land free that holds one fettered slave.
Until the manacled, slim wrists of babes
Are loosed to toss in childish sport and glee;
Until the Mother bears no burden save
The precious one beneath her heart; until
God's soil is rescued from the clutch of greed
And given back to labour, let no man
Call this the Land of Freedom.
A BACHELOR TO A MARRIED FLIRT
All that a man can say of woman's charms,
Mine eyes have spoken and my lips have told
To you a thousand times. Your perfect arms
(A replica from that lost Melos mould),
The fair firm crescents of your bosom (shown
With full intent to make their splendours known),
Your eyes (that mask with innocence their smile),
The (artful) artlessness of all your ways,
Your kiss-provoking mouth, its lure, its guile -
All these have had my fond and frequent praise.
And something more than praise to you I gave -
Something which made you know me as your slave.
Yet slaves, at times, grow mutinous and rebel.
Here in this morning hour, from you apart,
The mood is on me to be frank and tell
The thoughts long hidden deep down in my heart.
These thoughts are bitter--thorny plants, that grew
Below the flowers of praise I plucked for you.