The Old Soldier's Story: Poems and Prose Sketches

CHARLES H. PHILLIPS

OBIT NOVEMBER 5TH, 1881

 
O friend! There is no way
To bid farewell to thee!
The words that we would say
Above thy grave to-day
Still falter and delay
And fail us utterly.
 
 
When walking with us here,
The hand we loved to press
Was gentle, and sincere
As thy frank eyes were clear
Through every smile and tear
Of pleasure and distress.
 
 
In years, young; yet in thought
Mature; thy spirit, free,
And fired with fervor caught
Of thy proud sire, who fought
His way to fame, and taught
Its toilsome way to thee.
 
 
So even thou hast gained
The victory God-given —
Yea, as our cheeks are stained
With tears, and our souls pained
And mute, thou hast attained
Thy high reward in Heaven!
 

WHEN IT RAINS

 
When it rains, and with the rain
Never bird has heart to sing,
And across the window-pane
Is no sunlight glimmering;
When the pitiless refrain
Brings a tremor to the lips,
Our tears are like the rain
As it drips, drips, drips —
Like the sad, unceasing rain as it drips.
 
 
When the light of heaven's blue
Is blurred and blotted quite,
And the dreary day to you
Is but a long twilight;
When it seems that ne'er again
Shall the sun break its eclipse,
Our tears are like the rain
As it drips, drips, drips —
Like the endless, friendless rain as it drips.
 
 
When it rains! weary heart,
O be of better cheer!
The leaden clouds will part,
And the morrow will be clear;
Take up your load again,
With a prayer upon your lips,
Thanking Heaven for the rain
As it drips, drips, drips —
With the golden bow of promise as it drips.
 

AN ASSASSIN

 
Cat-like he creeps along where ways are dim,
From covert unto covert's secrecy;
His shadow in the moonlight shrinks from him
And crouches warily.
 
 
He hugs strange envies to his breast, and nurses
Wild hatreds, till the murderous hand he grips
Falls, quivering with the tension of the curses
He launches from his lips.
 
 
Drenched in his victim's blood he holds high revel;
He mocks at justice, and in all men's eyes
Insults his God – and no one but the devil
Is sorry when he dies.
 

BEST OF ALL

 
Of all good gifts that the Lord lets fall,
Is not silence the best of all?
 
 
The deep, sweet hush when the song is closed,
And every sound but a voiceless ghost;
 
 
And every sigh, as we listening leant,
A breathless quiet of vast content?
 
 
The laughs we laughed have a purer ring
With but their memory echoing;
 
 
And the joys we voiced, and the words we said,
Seem so dearer for being dead.
 
 
So of all good gifts that the Lord lets fall,
Is not silence the best of all?
 

BIN A-FISHIN'

 
W'en de sun's gone down, un de moon is riz,
Bin a-fishin'! Bin a-fishin'!
It's I's aguine down wha' the by-o is!
Bin a-fishin' all night long!
 

Chorus

 
Bin a-fishin'! Bin a-fishin'!
Bin a-fishin' clean fum de dusk of night
Twell away 'long on in de mornin' light.
 
 
Bait my hook, un I plunk her down!
Bin a-fishin'! Bin a-fishin'!
Un I lay dat catfish weigh five pound!
Bin a-fishin' all night long!
 

Chorus

 
Folks tells me ut a sucker won't bite,
Bin a-fishin'! Bin a-fishin'!
Yit I lif' out fo' last Chuesday night,
Bin a-fishin' all night long!
 

Chorus

 
Little fish nibble un de big fish come;
Bin a-fishin'! Bin a-fishin'!
"Go way, little fish! I want some!"
Bin a-fishin' all night long!
 

Chorus

 
Sez de bull frog, "D-runk!" sez de ole owl, "Whoo!"
Bin a-fishin'! Bin a-fishin'!
'Spec, Mr. Nigger, dey's a-meanin' you,
Bin a-fishin' all night long!
 

Chorus

UNCLE DAN'L IN TOWN OVER SUNDAY

 
I cain't git used to city ways —
Ner never could, I' bet my hat!
Jevver know jes' whur I was raised? —
Raised on a farm! D' ever tell you that?
Was undoubtatly, I declare!
And now, on Sunday – fun to spare
Around a farm! Why jes' to set
Up on the top three-cornered rail
Of Pap's old place, nigh La Fayette,
I'd swap my soul off, hide and tail!
You fellers in the city here,
You don't know nothin'! – S'pose to-day,
This clatterin' Sunday, you waked up
Without no jinglin'-janglin' bells,
Ner rattlin' of the milkman's cup,
Ner any swarm of screechin' birds
Like these here English swallers – S'pose
Ut you could miss all noise like those,
And git shet o' thinkin' of 'em afterwerds,
And then, in the country, wake and hear
Nothin' but silence – wake and see
Nothin' but green woods fur and near? —
What sort o' Sunday would that be?..
Wisht I hed you home with me!
Now think! The laziest of all days —
To git up any time – er sleep —
Er jes' lay round and watch the haze
A-dancin' 'crost the wheat, and keep
My pipe a-goern laisurely,
And puff and whiff as pleases me —
And ef I leave a trail of smoke
Clean through the house, no one to say,
"Wah! throw that nasty thing away;
Hev some regyard fer decency!"
To walk round barefoot, if you choose;
Er saw the fiddle – er dig some bait
And go a-fishin' – er pitch hoss shoes
Out in the shade somewhurs, and wait
For dinner-time, with an appetite
Ut folks in town cain't equal quite!
To laze around the barn and poke
Fer hens' nests – er git up a match
Betwixt the boys, and watch 'em scratch
And rassle round, and sweat and swear
And quarrel to their hearts' content;
And me a-jes' a-settin' there
A-hatchin' out more devilment!
What sort o' Sunday would that be?..
Wisht I hed you home with me!
 

SOLDIERS HERE TO-DAY

I

 
Soldiers and saviours of the homes we love;
Heroes and patriots who marched away,
And who marched back, and who marched on above —
All – all are here to-day!
 
 
By the dear cause you fought for – you are here;
At summons of bugle, and the drum
Whose palpitating syllables were ne'er
More musical, you come!
 
 
Here – by the stars that bloom in fields of blue,
And by the bird above with shielding wings;
And by the flag that floats out over you,
With silken beckonings —
 
 
Ay, here beneath its folds are gathered all
Who warred unscathed for blessings that it gave —
Still blessed its champion, though it but fall
A shadow on his grave!
 

II

 
We greet you, Victors, as in vast array
You gather from the scenes of strife and death —
From spectral fortress walls where curls away
The cannon's latest breath.
 
 
We greet you – from the crumbling battlements
Where once again the old flag feels the breeze
Stroke out its tattered stripes and smooth its rents
With rippling ecstasies.
 
 
From living tombs where every hope seemed lost —
With famine quarantined by bristling guns —
The prison pens – the guards – the "dead-line" crossed
By – riddled skeletons!
 
 
From furrowed plains, sown thick with bursting shells —
From mountain gorge, and toppling crags o'erhead —
From wards of pestilential hospitals,
And trenches of the dead.
 

III

 
In fancy all are here. The night is o'er,
And through dissolving mists the morning gleams;
And clustered round their hearths we see once more
The heroes of our dreams.
 
 
Strong, tawny faces, some, and some are fair,
And some are marked with age's latest prime,
And, seer-like, browed and aureoled with hair
As hoar as winter-time.
 
 
The faces of fond lovers, glorified —
The faces of the husband and the wife —
The babe's face nestled at the mother's side,
And smiling back at life;
 
 
A bloom of happiness in every cheek —
A thrill of tingling joy in every vein —
In every soul a rapture they will seek
In Heaven, and find again!
 

IV

 
'Tis not a vision only – we who pay
But the poor tribute of our praises here
Are equal sharers in the guerdon they
Purchased at price so dear.
 
 
The angel, Peace, o'er all uplifts her hand,
Waving the olive, and with heavenly eyes
Shedding a light of love o'er sea and land
As sunshine from the skies —
 
 
Her figure pedestalled on Freedom's soil —
Her sandals kissed with seas of golden grain —
Queen of a realm of joy-requited toil
That glories in her reign.
 
 
O blessed land of labor and reward!
O gracious Ruler, let Thy reign endure;
In pruning-hook and ploughshare beat the sword,
And reap the harvest sure!
 

SHADOW AND SHINE

 
Storms of the winter, and deepening snows,
When will you end? I said,
For the soul within me was numb with woes,
And my heart uncomforted.
When will you cease, O dismal days?
When will you set me free?
For the frozen world and its desolate ways
Are all unloved of me!
 
 
I waited long, but the answer came —
The kiss of the sunshine lay
Warm as a flame on the lips that frame
The song in my heart to-day.
Blossoms of summer-time waved in the air,
Glimmers of sun in the sea;
Fair thoughts followed me everywhere,
And the world was dear to me.
 

THAT NIGHT

 
You and I, and that night, with its perfume and glory! —
The scent of the locusts – the light of the moon;
And the violin weaving the waltzers a story,
Enmeshing their feet in the weft of the tune,
Till their shadows uncertain
Reeled round on the curtain,
While under the trellis we drank in the June.
 
 
Soaked through with the midnight the cedars were sleeping,
Their shadowy tresses outlined in the bright
Crystal, moon-smitten mists, where the fountain's heart, leaping
Forever, forever burst, full with delight;
And its lisp on my spirit
Fell faint as that near it
Whose love like a lily bloomed out in the night.
 
 
O your love was an odorous sachet of blisses!
The breath of your fan was a breeze from Cathay!
And the rose at your throat was a nest of spilled kisses! —
And the music! – in fancy I hear it to-day,
As I sit here, confessing
Our secret, and blessing
My rival who found us, and waltzed you away.
 

AUGUST

 
O mellow month and merry month,
Let me make love to you,
And follow you around the world
As knights their ladies do.
I thought your sisters beautiful,
Both May and April, too,
But April she had rainy eyes,
And May had eyes of blue.
 
 
And June – I liked the singing
Of her lips – and liked her smile —
But all her songs were promises
Of something, after while;
And July's face – the lights and shades
That may not long beguile
With alterations o'er the wheat
The dreamer at the stile.
 
 
But you! – ah, you are tropical,
Your beauty is so rare;
Your eyes are clearer, deeper eyes
Than any, anywhere;
Mysterious, imperious,
Deliriously fair,
O listless Andalusian maid,
With bangles in your hair!
 

THE GUIDE

IMITATED

 
We rode across the level plain —
We – my sagacious guide and I. —
He knew the earth – the air – the sky;
He knew when it would blow or rain,
And when the weather would be dry:
The blended blades of grass spake out
To him when Redskins were about;
The wagon tracks would tell him too,
The very day that they rolled through:
He knew their burden – whence they came —
If any horse along were lame,
And what its owner ought to do;
He knew when it would snow; he knew,
By some strange intuition, when
The buffalo would overflow
The prairies like a flood, and then
Recede in their stampede again.
He knew all things – yea, he did know
The brand of liquor in my flask,
And many times did tilt it up,
Nor halt or hesitate one whit,
Nor pause to slip the silver cup
From off its crystal base, nor ask
Why I preferred to drink from it.
And more and more I plied him, and
Did query of him o'er and o'er,
And seek to lure from him the lore
By which the man did understand
These hidden things of sky and land:
And, wrought upon, he sudden drew
His bridle – wheeled, and caught my hand —
Pressed it, as one that loved me true,
And bade me listen.
… There be few
Like tales as strange to listen to!
He told me all – How, when a child,
The Indians stole him – there he laughed —
"They stole me, and I stole their craft!"
Then slowly winked both eyes, and smiled,
And went on ramblingly, – "And they —
They reared me, and I ran away —
'Twas winter, and the weather wild;
And, caught up in the awful snows
That bury wilderness and plain,
I struggled on until I froze
My feet ere human hands again
Were reached to me in my distress, —
And lo, since then not any rain
May fall upon me anywhere,
Nor any cyclone's cussedness
Slip up behind me unaware, —
Nor any change of cold, or heat,
Or blow, or snow, but I do know
It's coming, days and days before; —
I know it by my frozen feet —
I know it by my itching heels,
And by the agony one feels
Who knows that scratching nevermore
Will bring to him the old and sweet
Relief he knew ere thus endowed
With knowledge that a certain cloud
Will burst with storm on such a day,
And when a snow will fall, and – nay,
I speak not falsely when I say
That by my tingling heels and toes
I measure time, and can disclose
The date of month – the week – and lo,
The very day and minute – yea —
Look at your watch! – An hour ago
And twenty minutes I did say
Unto myself with bitter laugh,
'In less than one hour and a half
Will I be drunken!' Is it so?"
 

SUTTER'S CLAIM

IMITATED

 
Say! you feller! You—
With that spade and the pick! —
What do you 'pose to do
On this side o' the crick?
Goin' to tackle this claim? Well, I reckon
You'll let up ag'in, purty quick!
 
 
No bluff, understand, —
But the same has been tried,
And the claim never panned —
Or the fellers has lied, —
For they tell of a dozen that tried it,
And quit it most onsatisfied.
 
 
The luck's dead ag'in it! —
The first man I see
That stuck a pick in it
Proved that thing to me, —
For he sort o' took down, and got homesick,
And went back whar he'd orto be!
 
 
Then others they worked it
Some – more or less,
But finally shirked it,
In grades of distress, —
With an eye out – a jaw or skull busted,
Or some sort o' seriousness.
 
 
The last one was plucky —
He wasn't afeerd,
And bragged he was "lucky,"
And said that "he'd heerd
A heap of bluff-talk," and swore awkard
He'd work any claim that he keered!
 
 
Don't you strike nary lick
With that pick till I'm through;
This-here feller talked slick
And as peart-like as you!
And he says: "I'll abide here
As long as I please!"
But he didn't… He died here —
And I'm his disease!
 

HER LIGHT GUITAR

 
She twankled a tune on her light guitar —
A low, sweet jangle of tangled sounds,
As blurred as the voices of the fairies are,
Dancing in moondawn dales and downs;
And the tinkling drip of the strange refrain
Ran over the rim of my soul like rain.
 
 
The great blond moon in the midnight skies
Paused and poised o'er the trellis eaves,
And the stars, in the light of her upturned eyes,
Sifted their love through the rifted leaves,
Glittered and splintered in crystal mist
Down the glittering strings that her fingers kissed.
 
 
O the melody mad! O the tinkle and thrill
Of the ecstasy of the exquisite thing!
The red rose dropped from the window-sill
And lay in a long swoon quivering;
While the dying notes of the strain divine
Rippled in glee up my spellbound spine.
 

WHILE CIGARETTES TO ASHES TURN

I

 
"He smokes – and that's enough," says Ma —
"And cigarettes, at that!" says Pa.
 
 
"He must not call again," says she —
"He shall not call again!" says he.
 
 
They both glare at me as before —
Then quit the room and bang the door. —
 
 
While I, their wilful daughter, say,
"I guess I'll love him, anyway!"
 

II

 
At twilight, in his room, alone,
His careless feet inertly thrown
 
 
Across a chair, my fancy can
But worship this most worthless man!
 
 
I dream what joy it is to set
His slow lips round a cigarette,
 
 
With idle-humored whiff and puff —
Ah! this is innocent enough!
 
 
To mark the slender fingers raise
The waxen match's dainty blaze,
 
 
Whose chastened light an instant glows
On drooping lids and arching nose,
 
 
Then, in the sudden gloom, instead,
A tiny ember, dim and red,
 
 
Blooms languidly to ripeness, then
Fades slowly, and grows ripe again.
 

III

 
I lean back, in my own boudoir —
The door is fast, the sash ajar;
 
 
And in the dark, I smiling stare
At one wide window over there,
 
 
Where some one, smoking, pinks the gloom,
The darling darkness of his room!
 
 
I push my shutters wider yet,
And lo! I light a cigarette;
 
 
And gleam for gleam, and glow for glow,
Each pulse of light a word we know,
 
 
We talk of love that still will burn
While cigarettes to ashes turn.
 

TWO SONNETS TO THE JUNE-BUG

I

 
You make me jes' a little nervouser
Than any dog-gone bug I ever see!
And you know night's the time to pester me —
When any tetch at all 'll rub the fur
Of all my patience back'ards! You're the myrrh
And ruburb of my life! A bumblebee
Cain't hold a candle to you; and a he
Bald hornet, with a laminated spur
In his hip pocket, daresent even cheep
When you're around! And, dern ye! you have made
Me lose whole ricks and stacks and piles of sleep, —
And many of a livelong night I've laid
And never shut an eye, hearin' you keep
Up that eternal buzzin' serenade!
 

II

 
And I've got up and lit the lamp, and clum
On cheers and trunks and wash-stands and bureaus,
And all such dangerous articles as those,
And biffed at you with brooms, and never come
'In two feet of you, – maybe skeered you some, —
But what does that amount to when it throws
A feller out o' balance, and his nose
Gits barked ag'inst the mantel, while you hum
Fer joy around the room, and churn your head
Ag'inst the ceilin', and draw back and butt
The plasterin' loose, and drop – behind the bed,
Where never human-bein' ever putt
Harm's hand on you, er ever truthful said
He'd choked yer dern infernal wizzen shut!
 

AUTOGRAPHIC

For an Album

 
I feel, if aught I ought to rhyme,
I ought 'a' thought a longer time,
And ought 'a' caught a higher sense,
Of autocratic eloquence.
I ought 'a' sought each haughty Muse
That taught a thought I ought to use,
And fought and fraught, and so devised
A poem unmonotonized. —
But since all this was vain, I thought
I ought to simply say, – I ought
To thank you, as I ought to do,
And ought to bow my best to you;
And ought to trust not to intrude
A rudely wrought-up gratitude,
But ought to smile, and ought to laugh,
And ought to write – an autograph.
 

AN IMPROMPTU ON ROLLER SKATES

 
Rumble, tumble, growl, and grate!
Skip, and trip, and gravitate!
Lunge, and plunge, and thrash the planks
With your blameless, shameless shanks:
In excruciating pain,
Stand upon your head again,
And, uncoiling kink by kink,
Kick the roof out of the rink!
 
 
In derisive bursts of mirth,
Drop ka-whop and jar the earth!
Jolt your lungs down in your socks,
Oh! tempestuous equinox
Of dismembered legs and arms!
Strew your ways with wild alarms;
Fameward skoot and ricochet
On your glittering vertebræ!
 

WRITTEN IN BUNNER'S "AIRS FROM ARCADY"

 
O ever gracious Airs from Arcady!
What lack is there of any jocund thing
In glancing wit or glad imagining
Capricious fancy may not find in thee? —
The laugh of Momus, tempered daintily
To lull the ear and lure its listening;
The whistled syllables the birds of spring
Flaunt ever at our guessings what they be;
The wood, the seashore, and the clanging town;
The pets of fashion, and the ways of such;
The robe de chambre, and the russet gown;
The lordling's carriage, and the pilgrim's crutch —
From hale old Chaucer's wholesomeness, clean down
To our artistic Dobson's deftest touch!
 

IN THE AFTERNOON

 
You in the hammock; and I, near by,
Was trying to read, and to swing you, too;
And the green of the sward was so kind to the eye,
And the shade of the maples so cool and blue,
That often I looked from the book to you
To say as much, with a sigh.
 
 
You in the hammock. The book we'd brought
From the parlor – to read in the open air, —
Something of love and of Launcelot
And Guinevere, I believe, was there —
But the afternoon, it was far more fair
Than the poem was, I thought.
 
 
You in the hammock; and on and on
I droned and droned through the rhythmic stuff —
But, with always a half of my vision gone
Over the top of the page – enough
To caressingly gaze at you, swathed in the fluff
Of your hair and your odorous "lawn."
 
 
You in the hammock – and that was a year —
Fully a year ago, I guess —
And what do we care for their Guinevere
And her Launcelot and their lordliness! —
You in the hammock still, and – Yes —
Kiss me again, my dear!