Books: Poems of the Heart and Home
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Mrs. J.C. Yule (Pamela S. Vining) >> Poems of the Heart and Home
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11 Produced by Beth L. Constantine, Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
This file was produced from images generously made available by the
Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions.
POEMS OF THE
HEART AND HOME.
BY
MRS. J. C. YULE
(PAMELA S. VINING.)
INTRODUCTION.
In presenting this little book to her readers, the author is giving
back to them in a collected form much that has previously been given
them--anonymously, or under the _nom-de-plume_, first, of
"Emillia," then of "Xenette," or, finally, under her true name either
as Miss Vining or Mrs. Yule--and also, much that they have never
before seen.
Some of these poems have been widely circulated, not only in Canada,
but in the United States and Great Britain; and some appear for the
first time in the pages of this book. They are offered solely upon
their merits; and upon those alone they must stand or fall. Whatever
there is in them calculated to stir the heart of our common Humanity,
--to voice forth its joys or its sorrows,--to truly interpret its
emotions,--or to give utterance to its aspirations and its hopes, will
live; that which does not thus speak for Humanity, has no right to
live; and the sooner it finds a merited oblivion the better for its
author and the world.
These poems are essentially Canadian. They have nearly all been
written on Canadian soil;-their themes and incidents--those that are
not purely imaginary or suggested by current events in other
countries--are almost wholly Canadian; and they are mainly the
outgrowth of many and varied experiences in Canadian life.
To the author, there is hardly one that has not its little, local
history, and that does not awaken reminiscences of some quiet Canadian
home,--some rustic Canadian school-house,--some dreamy hour in the
beautiful Canadian forests,--some morning or evening walk amidst
Canadian scenery,--or some pleasant sail over Canadian waters.
They have been written under widely different circumstances; and, in
great part, in brief intervals snatched from the arduous duties of
teaching, or the more arduous ones of domestic life.
Of the personal experiences traceable through many of them, it is not
necessary to speak. We read in God's word that "_He fashioneth their
hearts alike_;" therefore there is little to be found in any human
experience, that has not its counterpart, in some sort, in every
other, and he alone is the true Poet who can so interpret his own,
that they will be recognized as, in some sense, the real, or possible
experiences of all.
Trusting that these unpretending lyrics may be able thus to touch a
responsive chord in many hearts, and with a sincere desire to offer a
worthy contribution to the literature of our new and prosperous
country, they are respectfully submitted to the public by the AUTHOR
INGERSOLL, ONT.,
Aug., 1881.
CONTENTS
Yes the weary Earth shall brighten
To a Day Lily
Living and Dying
Up the Nepigon
Look Up
Frost Flowers
The Beech nut Gatherer
Memory Bells
I will not Despair
God's Witnesses
The Assembly of the Dead
Be Still
Littlewit and Loftus
To a Motherless Babe
The Caged Bird's Song
Crossing the Red Sea
The Wayside Elm
Drowned
My Brother James and I
Idle
The World's Day
Brethren, Go!
Our Nation's Birthday
Our Field is the World
Sault Ste Marie
Brother, Rest
Loved and Lost, or the Sky Lark and the Violet
The Gracious Provider
Rest in Heaven
Good Night
The Old Church Choir
No other Name
Heart Pictures
Fellowship with Christ
An Allegory
The Cry of the Karens
Alone
Mary
'I am doing no good'
Hail, Risen Lord
Lines on the Death of a Young Mother
Patience
A Parting Hymn
The Dance of the Winds
Strike the Chords Softly
At Home
Sabbath Memories
The Eye that Never Sleeps
By and By
The One Refuge
Judson's Grave
"Shall be Free"
After Fifty Years
The Earth voice and its Answer
Beyond the Shadows
Autumn and Winter
Till To-morrow
Our Country, or, A Century of Progress
Jesus, the Soul's Rest
The Beautiful Artist
"Let us Pray"
Rich and Poor
Palmer
Balmy Morning
Song
The Ploughman
'He hath done all things we!'
Somewhere
The Tide
Eloise
Abraham Lincoln
God's Blessings
The Silent Messenger
Under the Snow
Longings
Point of Bliss
Away to the Hills
Flowers by a Grave
Three for Three
Now
Sunset
Sweet Evening Bells
Unknown
Onward
Looking Back
Minniebel
Weary
The Body to the Soul
Not Yet
Marguerite
Come unto Me
"I will not let thee go"
Greeting Hymn
One by One
Love
Evening Hymn
Death
I shall be satisfied
At the Grave of a Young Mother
Go, Dream no More
Come Home
Be in Earnest
Chlodine
The Bird and the Storm cloud
No Solitude
The Stray Lamb
Stay, Mother, Stay
Time for Bed
From the Old to the New
The Voice of Spring
Honour to Labor
The Miser
Broken
To our Parents
Under the Rod
The White Stone Canoe
Gone Before
Johanna
Stanzas
Canada
I laid me down and slept
Bright Thoughts for a Dark Day
The Drunkard's Child
The Names of Jesus
POEMS OF THE HEART AND HOME.
YES, THE WEARY EARTH SHALL BRIGHTEN.
Yes, the weary earth shall brighten--
Brighten in the perfect day,
And the fields that now but whiten,
Golden glow beneath the ray!
Slowly swelling in her bosom,
Long the precious seed has lain,--
Soon shall come the perfect blossom,
Soon, the rich, abundant grain!
Long has been the night of weeping,
But the morning dawns at length,
And, the misty heights o'ersweeping,
Lo, the sun comes forth in strength!
Down the slopes of ancient mountains,
Over plain, and vale, and stream,
Flood, and field, and sparkling fountains,
Speeds the warm rejoicing beam!
Think not God can fail His promise!
Think not Christ can be denied!
He shall see His spirit's travail--
He shall yet be satisfied!
Soon the "Harvest home" of angels
Shall resound from shore to shore,
And amid Earth's glad evangels,
Christ shall reign for evermore!
TO A DAY LILY
What! only to stay
For a single day?
Thou beautiful, bright hued on
Just to open thine eyes
To the blue of the skies
And the light of the glorious sun,
Then, to fade away
In the same rich ray,
And die ere the day is done?
Bright thing of a day
Thou hast caught a ray
From Morn's jewelled curtain fold
On thy burning cheek,
And the ruby streak
His dyed it with charms untold--
And the gorgeous vest
On thy queenly breast,
Is dashed with her choicest gold.
A statelier queen
Has never been seen,
A lovelier never will be!--
Nay, Solomon, dressed
In his kingliest best,
Was never a match for thee,
O beautiful flower,
O joy of an hour--
_And only an hour_--for me!
An hour, did I say?
Nay, loveliest, nay,
Not thus shall I part with thee,
But with subtle skill
I shall keep thee still,
Fadeless and fresh with me:--
Through toil and duty,
"A thing of beauty
Forever" my own to be'
As with drooping head
Amid thorns I tread,
I shall see thee unfold anew,
In the desert's dust,
Where journey I must,
Why beautiful form shall view,
And visions of Home
O'er my spirit will come,
As thro' tear-drops I gaze on you'
LIVING AND DYING.
Living for Christ, I die;--how strange, that I,
Thus dying, live,--and yet, thus living, die!
Living for Christ, I die;-yet wondrous thought,
In that same death a deathless life is wrought;--
Living, I die to Earth, to self, to sin;--
Oh, blessed death, in which such life I win!
Dying for Christ, I live!--death cannot be
A terror, then, to one from death set free'
Living for Christ, rich blessings I attain,
Yet, dying for Him, mine is greater gain
Life for my Lord, is death to sin and strife,
Yet death for Him is everlas'ing life!
Dying for Christ, I live!--and yet, not I,
But He lives in me, who did for me die.
I die to live,--He lives to die no more,
Who, in His death my own death-sentence bore
"To live is Christ," if Christ within me reign,
To die more blessed, since "to die is gain!"
UP THE NEPIGON.
How beautiful, how beautiful,
Beneath the morning sky,
In bridal veil of snowy mist,
These dreamy headlands lie!
How beautiful, in soft repose,
Upon the water's breast,
Steeped in the sunlight's golden calm,
These fairy islets rest!
A Sabbath hush enfolds the hills,
And broods upon the deep
Whose music every hollow fills,
And climbs each rocky steep,
Now low and soft like love's own sigh,
Now faint and far away,
Now plaining to the answering pines,
With melancholy lay.
Like white-winged birds, through azure depths,
Above the restless tide,
With snowy plume and golden crest,
The fleecy cloudlets glide;
Their dancing shadows fleck the deep,
Or flit above the green
Of emerald islands fast asleep
'Neath tranquil skies serene.
I watch the sunshine and the shade,
The sparkle and the gleam,
Till past and present seem to fade,
And life becomes a dream--
A fairy, fancy-tinted dream,
A sun-bright; summer rest,
In which I glide through shade and gleam
Past islands of the blest
How beautiful! "How beautiful!"
The quiet hills reply,
And each responsive cliff gives back
Its answer to the sky;--
"How beautiful!" the waves repeat,
And every cloudlet smiles,
And writes its answer on the green
Of countless summer isles.
'Tis past--this first, last, only look!--
And now, away, away,
To bear alone in Memory's book
The sunshine of to-day;
Yet oft, 'neath other skies than these,
With other scenes in view,
O isles of beauty, sunny seas,
I shall remember you!
LOOK UP
Christian, lookup? thy feet may slide;
This is a slippery way!
Yet One is walking by thy side
Whose arm should be thy stay,
Thou canst not see that blessed form,
Nor view that loving smile
With eager eyes thus earthward bent--
Christian, look up a while!
Christian, look up!--what seest thou here
To court thy anxious eyes?
Earth is beneath thee, lone and drear,
Above, thy native skies!
Beneath, the wreck of faded bloom,
The shadow, and the clod,
The broken reed, the open tomb,--
Above thee, is THY GOD!
Look up! thy head too long has been
Bowed darkly toward the earth,
Thou son of a most Royal Sire,
Creature of kingly birth!
What! dragging like a very slave
Earth's heavy galling chain,--
And struggling onward to the grave
In weariness and pain?
What wouldst thou with this world?--thy home,
Thy country is not here,
'Mid faded flowers, and perished bloom,
And shadows dense and drear!--
Thy home is where the tree of Life
Waves high its fruitage blest,
'Mid bowers with fadeless beauties rife,--
Look up, and claim thy rest!
FROST-FLOWERS.
Over my window in pencillings white,
Stealthily traced in the silence of night--
Traced with a pencil as viewless as air,
By an artist unseen, when the star-beams were fair,
Came wonderful pictures, so life-like and true
That I'm filled with amaze as the marvel I view.
Like, and yet unlike the things I have seen,--
Feathery ferns in the forest-depths green,
Delicate mosses that hide from the light,
Snow-drops, and lilies, and hyacinths white,
Fringes, and feathers, and half-opened flowers,
Closely-twined branches of dim, cedar bowers--
Strange, that one hand should so deftly combine
Such numberless charms in so quaint a design!
O wondrous creations of silence and night!
I watch as ye fade in the clear morning light,--
As ye melt into tear-drops and trickle away
From the keen, searching eyes of inquisitive Day.
While I gaze ye are gone, and I see you depart
With a wistful regret lying deep in my heart,--
A longing for something that will not decay,
Or melt like these frost-flowers in tear-drops away,--
A passionate yearning of heart for that shore
Where beauty unfading shall last evermore;
Nor, e'en as we gaze, from our vision be lost
Like the beautiful things that are pencilled in frost!
THE BEECH-NUT GATHERER.
All over the earth like a mantle,
Golden, and green, and grey,
Crimson, and scarlet, and yellow,
The Autumn foliage lay;--
The sun of the Indian Summer
Laughed at the bare old trees
As they shook their leafless branches
In the soft October breeze.
Gorgeous was every hill-side,
And gorgeous every nook,
And the dry, old log was gorgeous,
Spanning the little brook;
Its holiday robes, the forest
Had suddenly cast to earth,
And, as yet, seemed scarce to miss, them,
In its plenitude of mirth.
I walked where the leaves the softest,
The brightest, and goldenest lay,
And I thought of a forest hill-side,
And an Indian Summer day,--
Of an eager, little child-face
O'er the fallen leaves that bent,
As she gathered her cup of beech nuts,
With innocent content.
I thought of the small, brown fingers
Gleaning them one by one,
With the partridge drumming near her
In the forest bare and dun,
And the jet-black squirrel, winking
His saucy, jealous eye
At those tiny, pilfering fingers,
From his sly nook up on high
Ah, barefooted little maiden
With thy bonnetless, sun-burnt brow,
Thou glean'st no more on the hill-side--
Where art thou gleaning now?
I knew by the lifted glances
Of thy dark, imperious eye,
That the tall trees bending o'er thee
Would not shelter thee by and by.
The cottage by the brookside,
With its mossy roof is gone;--
The cattle have left the uplands,
The young lambs left the lawn;--
Gone are thy blue-eyed sister,
And thy brother's laughing brow;
And the beech-nuts He ungathered
On the lonely hill-side now.
What have the returning seasons
Brought to thy heart since then,
In thy long and weary wand'rings
In the paths of busy men?--
Has the Angel of grief, or of gladness,
Set his seal upon thy brow?
Maiden, joyous or tearful,
Where art thou gleaning now?
MEMORY-BELLS.
Up from the spirit-depths ringing,
Softly your melody swells,
Sweet as a seraphim's singing,
Tender-toned memory-bells!
The laughter of childhood,
The song of the wildwood,
The tinkle of streams through the echoing dell,
The voice of a mother,
The shout of a brother.
Up from life's morning melodiously swell.
Up from the spirit-depths ringing
Richly your melody swells,
Sweet reminiscences bringing,
Joyous-toned memory-bells!--
Youth's beautiful bowers,
Her dew-spangled flowers,
The pictures which Hope of futurity drew,--
Love's rapturous vision
Of regions Elysian,
In glowing perspective unfolding to view.
Up from the spirit-depths ringing,
Sadly your melody swells,
Tears with its mournful tones bringing,
Sorrowful memory-bells!
The first heart-link broken,
The first farewell spoken,
The first flow'ret crushed in life's desolate track,--
The agonized yearning
O'er joys unreturning,
All, all with your low, wailing music come back.
Up from the spirit-depths ringing.
Dirge-like your melody swells;
But Hope wipes the tears that are springing,
Mournful-toned memory-bells!
Above your deep knelling
Her soft voice is swelling,
Sweeter than angel-tones, silvery clear,
Singing:--in Heaven above,
All is unchanging love,
Mourner, look upward, thy home is not here!
I WILL NOT DESPAIR.
I will not despair while thou rulest the storm,
Though the red lightning stream o'er the cloud's sable-breast,
For I catch through the darkness bright gleams of thy form,
And I know 'tis thy voice lulls the tempest to rest--
The wild tempest to rest:
Nor yet, though the shadows of deepening night,
Hang over my path like the pall of despair;
For one star through the gloom sends its hallowed light,
And I know 'tis thy love smiling tenderly there,
--Ah! tenderly there.
I will not despair, though the fountain that burst
For me in life's desert be wasted and dry;
For thy love was the fountain that cheered me at first,
And again to its life-giving waters I fly--
O Holiest, fly!
No; I will not despair while thy hand points me on,
Though flowerless and thorny the path where I roam.
For a calm sunlight rests on the far hills beyond,
And I know 'tis the radiance that streams from my home,
--Home, beautiful home!
GOD'S WITNESSES.
A PEN PICTURE FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Upon the plain of Dura stood an image great and high,
With golden forehead broad and bright beneath the morning sky;
All regal in its majesty and kingly in its mien,
The grandest and most glorious thing the world had ever seen!
Full sixty cubits high in air the lordly head was reared,
And robed in gold from head to foot the stately form appeared;
Adown the breast six cubits broad, a flood of yellow gold,
All deftly wrought with matchless skill, its shining tresses rolled.
And, fronting thus the rising sun, it sent back ray for ray--
A golden flood of arrowy light--into-the face of day;
While round its feet, in awe and dread, all Shinar stood amazed,
And up into that radiant face with reverent wonder gazed.
Woke sackbut, psaltery, and harp, woke dulcimer and flute,--
Then prone in dust fell prince and peer, in lowly worship mute!
The wise, the gifted, and the great, the lordly and the base
Before the image bent the knee, and bowed in dust the face.
_Not all!_--for lo, three princely men, with calm, unaltered mien,
With unbowed heads and folded arms, gaze on the unhallowed scene!
The golden image awes them not, nor yet the king's decree,
They bow not at the idol's shrine, nor bend the servile knee.
"Wake, sackbut, psaltery, and harp--wake yet again!"--but nay,
With calm, pale faces, sad and stern, they slowly turn away;
The monarch's wrath, the furnace-flame, death, _death,_--they know it
all--
Yet all these horrors powerless are those high hearts to appal!
Haste, haste, obsequious minions, bear the tidings to your lord!
Go, tell him there are some who dare to disobey his word;
Men of the captive, Hebrew race, men high in place and power,
Who scorn to bow their haughty necks at his command this hour!
"Go, bring them nigh!" the monarch cries, with fury in his face,
"And set them here before my throne, these men of Hebrew race!
Now, Shadrach, Meshach, answer me, and thou, Abednego,
They tell me ye refuse to bow and worship!--is it so?
"But hearken: if, what time ye hear once more the pealing swell
Of sackbut, psaltery, and harp, ye bend in homage--well;
If not, the fiery furnace shall your quivering flesh devour!
Then where's the God can rescue you from my avenging power?"
Then answered they, the captive three, in calm, respectful tone,
While over each young, fearless brow faith's hallowed radiance shone,
"Behold, our God is for us now--our God, O King! and He
Is able to deliver us from the fierce flames and thee!
_"Yea, and He will deliver us!_--yet be it known to thee,
O King, that could we truly know, that so it would not be,
E'en then, we would not bow us down, or worship at the shrine
Of this vain image thou hast reared, or any god of thine!"
"Now lead ye forth these haughty men!" the wrathful monarch cried,
The while his face grew dark with rage and fury, so defied;
"Yea, heat the furnace seven fold, and in the fiercest flame
Blot out forever from the day each impious scorner's name!
"Ay, bind them well, ye mighty men, ye warriors stern and bold,
And let your cords be very strong, your fetters manifold!
For neither they nor He they trust shall foil my kingly ire,
Or save them from the wrathful flame of this devouring fire!
"Now cast them in!--but, oh!--my men!--they fade like morning mist!
Slain by the fierce, out-leaping flame no mortal may resist!
My warriors bold!--alas, alas!--I did not will it so!
Scathed by the fiery blast of death meant only for my foe!"
The king has risen to his feet!--what sight has fixed his gaze?
What mean the wonder in his face, the look of blank amaze?
And what the changed and falt'ring voice, as doubtfully he cries,
"Tell me, ye counsellors of mine, ye ancient men and wise,
"Did we not cast, each firmly bound, into the fiercest flame,
Three mortal men, for death designed, of Hebrew race and name?
Three?--_only three?_--or do I dream? What sight is this I view?"
And all his counsellors replied, "O monarch, it is true!"
"Yet now, amid the blinding flames, unbound, and calm, and free,
Walking, with firm and steady step, the fiery waves, I see
Not three, but four, and lo, the form of Him, the fourth I ween,
Is like the Son of God, so calm, so gracious is His mien!"
Then to the furnace mouth drew near the monarch with his train--
The baffled monarch, bowed and quelled, feeling how poor and vain
Were all his boasted pomp and power, how impotent and Week
The arm so void of strength that hour his mad revenge to wreak.
"Ho, Shadrach, Meshach, hasten ye! and thou, Abednego,
Servants of God Most High, come forth!" the monarch cried; and lo,
Without a touch or tinge of fire, or smell of scorching flame,
Forth, from the glowing heat intense, God's faithful servants came!
O, servants of a heathen king! all vainly would ye trace
Or hue, or stain, or smell of fire, on any form or face!
Those comely locks of raven hair, smooth and unscorched, behold;
Nor may ye find one trace of flame on any garment's fold!
Then cried the heathen king again--and, oh, how altered now
The tone and utterance!--how changed the haughty lip and brow!--
"Now blessed be the God who hath His angel sent to free
His servants who have trusted Him, and changed the King's decree;
"Who gave their bodies to the flame, rather than once to swerve
From their allegiance to the God whom they delight to serve!
Therefore, let no one speak against this Glorious One and Just,
Who saves, as none but He can save, the souls that in Him trust!"
Then calmly to their wonted toil, their worldly cares again,
Unconscious of their deathless fame, went forth those dauntless men;
Thrice blessed men! with whom, that day, their gracious Lord had
walked,
And lovingly, as friend with friend, of hallowed mysteries talked.
He walked with _them_ amid the flames! Oh, to the paths _we_ tread,
The brighter, smoother, greener paths, with summer-flowers o'erspread,
If but our weak hearts welcome Him, the same dear Lord will come,
And walk with us through countless snares, till we arrive at home!
THE ASSEMBLY OF THE DEAD.
["Dr. Reid, a traveller through the highlands of Peru, is said to have
found in the desert of Alcoama the dried remains of an assemblage of
human beings, five or six hundred in number, men, women, and children,
seated in a semicircle as when alive, staring into the burning waste
before them. It would seem that, knowing the Spanish invaders were at
hand, they had come hither with a fixed intention to die. They sat
immoveable in that dreary desert, dried like mummies by the hot air,
still sitting as if in solemn council, while over that Areopagus
silence broods everlastingly."]
With dull and lurid skies above,
And burning wastes around,
A lonely traveller journeyed on
Through solitudes profound;
No wandering bird's adventurous wing
Paused o'er that cheerless waste,
No tree across those dreary sands
A welcome shadow cast.
With scorching, pestilential breath
The desert-blast swept by,
And with a fierce, relentless glare
The sun looked from on high;
Yet onward still, though worn with toil,
The eager wand'rer pressed,
While hope lit up his dauntless eye,
And nerved his fainting breast.
Why paused he in his onward course?--
Why held his shuddering breath?--
Why gazed he with bewildered eye,
As on the face of death?
Before him sat in stern array,
All hushed as if in dread,
Yet still, and passionless, and calm,
A concourse of the dead!
Across the burning waste they stared
With glazed and stony eye,
As if strange fear had fixed erewhile
Their gaze on vacancy;
And woe and dread on every brow
In changeless lines were wrought,--
Sad traces of the anguish deep
That filled their latest thought!
They seemed a race of other time,
O'er whom the desert's blast,
For many a long and weary age,
In fiery wrath had passed;
Till, scathed and dry, each wasted form
Its rigid aspect wore,
Unchanged, though centuries had passed
The lonely desert o'er.
Was it the clash of foreign arms--
Was it the invader's tread,--
From which this simple-minded race
In wildest terror fled,--
Choosing, amid the desert-sands,
Scorched by the desert's breath,
Rather than by the invaders' steel,
To meet the stroke of death?
And there they died--a free-born race--
From their proud hills away,
While round them in its lonely pride
The far, free desert lay
And there, unburied, still they sit,
All statute like and cold,
Free, e'en in death, though o'er their homes
Oppression's tide has rolled!
BE STILL.
O throbbing heart, be still!
Canst thou not bear
The heavy dash of Memory's troubled tide,
Long sternly pent, but broken forth again,
Sweeping all barriers ruthlessly aside,
And leaving desolation in its train
Where all was fair?
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