The White Bees
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Henry Van Dyke >> The White Bees
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The White Bees
by Henry van Dyke
CONTENTS
THE WHITE BEES
NEW YEAR'S EVE
SONGS FOR AMERICA
Sea-Gulls of Manhattan
Urbs Coronata
America
Doors of Daring
A Home Song
A Noon Song
An American in Europe
The Ancestral Dwellings
Francis Makemie
National Monuments
IN PRAISE OF POETS
Mother Earth
Milton: Three Sonnets
Wordsworth
Keats
Shelley
Robert Browning
Longfellow
Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Edmund Clarence Stedman
LYRICS, DRAMATIC AND PERSONAL
Late Spring
Nepenthe
Hesper
Arrival
Departure
The Black Birds
Without Disguise
Gratitude
Master of Music
Stars and the Soul
To Julia Marlowe
Pan Learns Music
"Undine"
Love in a Look
My April Lady
A Lover's Envy
The Hermit Thrush
Fire-Fly City
The Gentle Traveller
Sicily, December, 1908
The Window
Twilight in the Alps
Jeanne D'Arc
Hudson's Last Voyage
THE WHITE BEES AND OTHER POEMS
THE WHITE BEES
I
LEGEND
Long ago Apollo called to Aristaeus, youngest
of the shepherds,
Saying, "I will make you keeper of my bees."
Golden were the hives, and golden was the honey;
golden, too, the music,
Where the honey-makers hummed among the trees.
Happy Aristaeus loitered in the garden, wandered
in the orchard,
Careless and contented, indolent and free;
Lightly took his labour, lightly took his pleasure,
till the fated moment
When across his pathway came Eurydice.
Then her eyes enkindled burning love within him;
drove him wild with longing,
For the perfect sweetness of her flower-like face;
Eagerly he followed, while she fled before him,
over mead and mountain,
On through field and forest, in a breathless
race.
But the nymph, in flying, trod upon a serpent;
like a dream she vanished;
Pluto's chariot bore her down among the dead;
Lonely Aristaeus, sadly home returning, found his
garden empty,
All the hives deserted, all the music fled.
Mournfully bewailing,--"ah, my honey-makers,
where have you departed?"--
Far and wide he sought them, over sea and shore;
Foolish is the tale that says he ever found them,
brought them home in triumph,--
Joys that once escape us fly for evermore.
Yet I dream that somewhere, clad in downy
whiteness, dwell the honey-makers,
In aerial gardens that no mortal sees:
And at times returning, lo, they flutter round us,
gathering mystic harvest,--
So I weave the legend of the long-lost bees.
II
THE SWARMING OF THE BEES
I
Who can tell the hiding of the white bees'
nest?
Who can trace the guiding of their swift home
flight?
Far would be his riding on a life-long quest:
Surely ere it ended would his beard grow
white.
Never in the coming of the rose-red Spring,
Never in the passing of the wine-red Fall,
May you hear the humming of the white bee's
wing
Murmur o'er the meadow, ere the night bells
call.
Wait till winter hardens in the cold grey sky,
Wait till leaves are fallen and the brooks all
freeze,
Then above the gardens where the dead flowers
lie,
Swarm the merry millions of the wild white
bees.
II
Out of the high-built airy hive,
Deep in the clouds that veil the sun,
Look how the first of the swarm arrive;
Timidly venturing, one by one,
Down through the tranquil air,
Wavering here and there,
Large, and lazy in flight,--
Caught by a lift of the breeze,
Tangled among the naked trees,--
Dropping then, without a sound,
Feather-white, feather-light,
To their rest on the ground.
III
Thus the swarming is begun.
Count the leaders, every one
Perfect as a perfect star
Till the slow descent is done.
Look beyond them, see how far
Down the vistas dim and grey,
Multitudes are on the way.
Now a sudden brightness
Dawns within the sombre day,
Over fields of whiteness;
And the sky is swiftly alive
With the flutter and the flight
Of the shimmering bees, that pour
From the hidden door of the hive
Till you can count no more.
IV
Now on the branches of hemlock and pine
Thickly they settle and cluster and swing,
Bending them low; and the trellised vine
And the dark elm-boughs are traced with a line
Of beauty wherever the white bees cling.
Now they are hiding the wrecks of the flowers,
Softly, softly, covering all,
Over the grave of the summer hours
Spreading a silver pall.
Now they are building the broad roof ledge,
Into a cornice smooth and fair,
Moulding the terrace, from edge to edge,
Into the sweep of a marble stair.
Wonderful workers, swift and dumb,
Numberless myriads, still they come,
Thronging ever faster, faster, faster!
Where is their queen? Who is their master?
The gardens are faded, the fields are frore,--
How will they fare in a world so bleak?
Where is the hidden honey they seek?
What is the sweetness they toil to store
In the desolate day, where no blossoms gleam?
Forgetfulness and a dream!
V
But now the fretful wind awakes;
I hear him girding at the trees;
He strikes the bending boughs, and shakes
The quiet clusters of the bees
To powdery drift;
He tosses them away,
He drives them like spray;
He makes them veer and shift
Around his blustering path.
In clouds blindly whirling,
In rings madly swirling,
Full of crazy wrath,
So furious and fast they fly
They blur the earth and blot the sky
In wild, white mirk.
They fill the air with frozen wings
And tiny, angry, icy stings;
They blind the eyes, and choke the breath,
They dance a maddening dance of death
Around their work,
Sweeping the cover from the hill,
Heaping the hollows deeper still,
Effacing every line and mark,
And swarming, storming in the dark
Through the long night;
Until, at dawn, the wind lies down,
Weary of fight.
The last torn cloud, with trailing gown,
Passes the open gates of light;
And the white bees are lost in flight.
VI
Look how the landscape glitters wide and still,
Bright with a pure surprise!
The day begins with joy, and all past ill,
Buried in white oblivion, lies
Beneath the snowdrifts under crystal skies.
New hope, new love, new life, new cheer,
Flow in the sunrise beam,--
The gladness of Apollo when he sees,
Upon the bosom of the wintry year,
The honey-harvest of his wild white bees,
Forgetfulness and a dream!
III
LEGEND
Listen, my beloved, while the silver morning,
like a tranquil vision,
Fills the world around us and our hearts with
peace;
Quiet is the close of Aristaeus' legend, happy is
the ending--
Listen while I tell you how he found release.
Many months he wandered far away in sadness,
desolately thinking
Only of the vanished joys he could not find;
Till the great Apollo, pitying his shepherd, loosed
him from the burden
Of a dark, reluctant, backward-looking mind.
Then he saw around him all the changeful beauty
of the changing seasons,
In the world-wide regions where his journey
lay;
Birds that sang to cheer him, flowers that bloomed
beside him, stars that shone to guide him,--
Traveller's joy was plenty all along the way!
Everywhere he journeyed strangers made him
welcome, listened while he taught them
Secret lore of field and forest he had learned:
How to train the vines and make the olives fruit-
ful; how to guard the sheepfolds;
How to stay the fever when the dog-star burned.
Friendliness and blessing followed in his foot-
steps; richer were the harvests,
Happier the dwellings, wheresoe'er he came;
Little children loved him, and he left behind him,
in the hour of parting,
Memories of kindness and a god-like name.
So he travelled onward, desolate no longer,
patient in his seeking,
Reaping all the wayside comfort of his quest;
Till at last in Thracia, high upon Mount Haemus,
far from human dwelling,
Weary Aristaeus laid him down to rest.
Then the honey-makers, clad in downy whiteness,
fluttered soft around him,
Wrapt him in a dreamful slumber pure and
deep.
This is life, beloved: first a sheltered garden,
then a troubled journey,
Joy and pain of seeking,--and at last we sleep!
NEW YEAR'S EVE
I
The other night I had a dream, most clear
And comforting, complete
In every line, a crystal sphere,
And full of intimate and secret cheer.
Therefore I will repeat
That vision, dearest heart, to you,
As of a thing not feigned, but very true,
Yes, true as ever in my life befell;
And you, perhaps, can tell
Whether my dream was really sad or sweet.
II
The shadows flecked the elm-embowered street
I knew so well, long, long ago;
And on the pillared porch where Marguerite
Had sat with me, the moonlight lay like snow.
But she, my comrade and my friend of youth,
Most gaily wise,
Most innocently loved,--
She of the blue-grey eyes
That ever smiled and ever spoke the truth,--
From that familiar dwelling, where she moved
Like mirth incarnate in the years before,
Had gone into the hidden house of Death.
I thought the garden wore
White mourning for her blessed innocence,
And the syringa's breath
Came from the corner by the fence,
Where she had made her rustic seat,
With fragrance passionate, intense,
As if it breathed a sigh for Marguerite.
My heart was heavy with a sense
Of something good forever gone. I sought
Vainly for some consoling thought,
Some comfortable word that I could say
To the sad father, whom I visited again
For the first time since she had gone away.
The bell rang shrill and lonely,--then
The door was opened, and I sent my name
To him,--but ah! 't was Marguerite who came!
There in the dear old dusky room she stood
Beneath the lamp, just as she used to stand,
In tender mocking mood.
"You did not ask for me," she said,
"And so I will not let you take my hand;
"But I must hear what secret talk you planned
"With father. Come, my friend, be good,
"And tell me your affairs of state:
"Why you have stayed away and made me wait
"So long. Sit down beside me here,--
"And, do you know, it seemed a year
"Since we have talked together,--why so late?"
Amazed, incredulous, confused with joy
I hardly dared to show,
And stammering like a boy,
I took the place she showed me at her side;
And then the talk flowed on with brimming tide
Through the still night,
While she with influence light
Controlled it, as the moon the flood.
She knew where I had been, what I had done,
What work was planned, and what begun;
My troubles, failures, fears she understood,
And touched them with a heart so kind,
That every care was melted from my mind,
And every hope grew bright,
And life seemed moving on to happy ends.
(Ah, what self-beggared fool was he
That said a woman cannot be
The very best of friends?)
Then there were memories of old times,
Recalled with many a gentle jest;
And at the last she brought the book of rhymes
We made together, trying to translate
The Songs of Heine (hers were always best).
"Now come," she said,
"To-night we will collaborate
"Again; I'll put you to the test.
"Here's one I never found the way to do,--
"The simplest are the hardest ones, you know,--
"I give this song to you."
And then she read:
Mein kind, wir waren Kinder,
Zwei Kinder, jung und froh.
But all the while a silent question stirred
Within me, though I dared not speak the word:
"Is it herself, and is she truly here,
"And was I dreaming when I heard
"That she was dead last year?
"Or was it true, and is she but a shade
"Who brings a fleeting joy to eye and ear,
"Cold though so kind, and will she gently fade
"When her sweet ghostly part is played
"And the light-curtain falls at dawn of day?"
But while my heart was troubled by this fear
So deeply that I could not speak it out,
Lest all my happiness should disappear,
I thought me of a cunning way
To hide the question and dissolve the doubt.
"Will you not give me now your hand,
"Dear Marguerite," I asked, "to touch and hold,
"That by this token I may understand
"You are the same true friend you were of old?"
She answered with a smile so bright and calm
It seemed as if I saw new stars arise
In the deep heaven of her eyes;
And smiling so, she laid her palm
In mine. Dear God, it was not cold
But warm with vital heat!
"You live!" I cried, "you live, dear Marguerite!"
Then I awoke; but strangely comforted,
Although I knew again that she was dead.
III
Yes, there's the dream! And was it sweet or
sad?
Dear mistress of my waking and my sleep,
Present reward of all my heart's desire,
Watching with me beside the winter fire,
Interpret now this vision that I had.
But while you read the meaning, let me keep
The touch of you: for the Old Year with storm
Is passing through the midnight, and doth shake
The corners of the house,--and oh! my heart
would break
Unless both dreaming and awake
My hand could feel your hand was warm, warm,
warm!
SONGS FOR AMERICA
SEA-GULLS OF Manhattan
Children of the elemental mother,
Born upon some lonely island shore
Where the wrinkled ripples run and whisper,
Where the crested billows plunge and roar;
Long-winged, tireless roamers and adventurers,
Fearless breasters of the wind and sea,
In the far-off solitary places
I have seen you floating wild and free!
Here the high-built cities rise around you;
Here the cliffs that tower east and west,
Honeycombed with human habitations,
Have no hiding for the sea-bird's nest:
Here the river flows begrimed and troubled;
Here the hurrying, panting vessels fume,
Restless, up and down the watery highway,
While a thousand chimneys vomit gloom.
Toil and tumult, conflict and confusion,
Clank and clamor of the vast machine
Human hands have built for human bondage--
Yet amid it all you float serene;
Circling, soaring, sailing, swooping lightly
Down to glean your harvest from the wave;
In your heritage of air and water,
You have kept the freedom Nature gave.
Even so the wild-woods of Manhattan
Saw your wheeling flocks of white and grey;
Even so you fluttered, followed, floated,
Round the Half-Moon creeping up the bay;
Even so your voices creaked and chattered,
Laughing shrilly o'er the tidal rips,
While your black and beady eyes were glistening
Round the sullen British prison-ships.
Children of the elemental mother,
Fearless floaters 'mid the double blue,
From the crowded boats that cross the ferries
Many a longing heart goes out to you.
Though the cities climb and close around us,
Something tells us that our souls are free,
While the sea-gulls fly above the harbor,
While the river flows to meet the sea!
URBS CORONATA
(Song for the City College of New York)
O youngest of the giant brood
Of cities far-renowned;
In wealth and power thou hast passed
Thy rivals at a bound;
And now thou art a queen, New York;
And how wilt thou be crowned?
"Weave me no palace-wreath of pride,"
The royal city said;
"Nor forge an iron fortress-wall
To frown upon my head;
But let me wear a diadem
Of Wisdom's towers instead."
And so upon her island height
She worked her will forsooth,
She set upon her rocky brow
A citadel of Truth,
A house of Light, a home of Thought,
A shrine of noble Youth.
Stand here, ye City College towers,
And look both up and down;
Remember all who wrought for you
Within the toiling town;
Remember all they thought for you,
And all the hopes they brought for you,
And be the City's Crown.
AMERICA
I Love thine inland seas,
Thy groves of giant trees,
Thy rolling plains;
Thy rivers' mighty sweep,
Thy mystic canyons deep,
Thy mountains wild and steep,
All thy domains;
Thy silver Eastern strands,
Thy Golden Gate that stands
Wide to the West;
Thy flowery Southland fair,
Thy sweet and crystal air,--
O land beyond compare,
Thee I love best!
Additional verses for the National Hymn, March, 1906.
DOORS OF DARING
The mountains that enfold the vale
With walls of granite, steep and high,
Invite the fearless foot to scale
Their stairway toward the sky.
The restless, deep, dividing sea
That flows and foams from shore to shore,
Calls to its sunburned chivalry,
"Push out, set sail, explore!"
And all the bars at which we fret,
That seem to prison and control,
Are but the doors of daring, set
Ajar before the soul.
Say not, "Too poor," but freely give;
Sigh not, "Too weak," but boldly try.
You never can begin to live
Until you dare to die.
A HOME SONG
I Read within a poet's book
A word that starred the page:
"Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage!"
Yes, that is true; and something more
You'll find, where'er you roam,
That marble floors and gilded walls
Can never make a home.
But every house where Love abides,
And Friendship is a guest,
Is surely home, and home-sweet-home:
For there the heart can rest.
A NOON SONG
There are songs for the morning and songs
for the night,
For sunrise and sunset, the stars and the moon;
But who will give praise to the fulness of light,
And sing us a song of the glory of noon?
Oh, the high noon, and the clear noon,
The noon with golden crest;
When the sky burns, and the sun turns
With his face to the way of the west!
How swiftly he rose in the dawn of his strength;
How slowly he crept as the morning wore by;
Ah, steep was the climbing that led him at length
To the height of his throne in the blue summer
sky.
Oh, the long toil, and the slow toil,
The toil that may not rest,
Till the sun looks down from his journey's
crown,
To the wonderful way of the west!
AN AMERICAN IN EUROPE
'Tis fine to see the Old World, and travel up
and down
Among the famous palaces and cities of renown,
To admire the crumbly castles and the statues of
the kings,--
But now I think I've had enough of antiquated
things.
So it's home again, and home again, America for
me I
My heart is turning home again, and there I long to
be,
In the land of youth and freedom beyond the ocean
bars,
Where the air is full of sunlight and the flag is full
of stars.
Oh, London is a man's town, there's power in
the air;
And Paris is a woman's town, with flowers in
her hair;
And it's sweet to dream in Venice, and it's great
to study Rome;
But when it comes to living there is no place like
home.
I like the German fir-woods, in green battalions
drilled;
I like the gardens of Versailles with flashing
fountains filled;
But, oh, to take your hand, my dear, and ramble
for a day
In the friendly western woodland where Nature
has her way!
I know that Europe's wonderful, yet something
seems to lack:
The Past is too much with her, and the people
looking back.
But the glory of the Present is to make the
Future free,--
We love our land for what she is and what she
is to be.
Oh, it's home again, and home again, America for
me I
I want a ship that's westward bound to plough the
rotting sea.
To the blessed Land of Room Enough beyond the
ocean bars,
Where the air is full of sunlight and the flag is full
of stars.
THE ANCESTRAL DWELLINGS
Dear to my heart are the ancestral dwellings
of America,
Dearer than if they were haunted by ghosts of
royal splendour;
These are the homes that were built by the brave
beginners of a nation,
They are simple enough to be great, and full of
a friendly dignity.
I love the old white farmhouses nestled in New
England valleys,
Ample and long and low, with elm-trees feather-
ing over them:
Borders of box in the yard, and lilacs, and old-
fashioned flowers,
A fan-light above the door, and little square panes
in the windows,
The wood-shed piled with maple and birch and
hickory ready for winter,
The gambrel-roof with its garret crowded with
household relics,--
All the tokens of prudent thrift and the spirit of
self-reliance.
I love the look of the shingled houses that front
the ocean;
Their backs are bowed, and their lichened sides
are weather-beaten;
Soft in their colour as grey pearls, they are full
of patience and courage.
They seem to grow out of the rocks, there is
something indomitable about them:
Pacing the briny wind in a lonely land they stand
undaunted,
While the thin blue line of smoke from the
square-built chimney rises,
Telling of shelter for man, with room for a hearth
and a cradle.
I love the stately southern mansions with their
tall white columns,
They look through avenues of trees, over fields
where the cotton is growing;
I can see the flutter of white frocks along their
shady porches,
Music and laughter float from the windows, the
yards are full of hounds and horses.
They have all ridden away, yet the houses have
not forgotten,
They are proud of their name and place, and
their doors are always open,
For the thing they remember best is the pride
of their ancient hospitality.
In the towns I love the discreet and tranquil
Quaker dwellings,
With their demure brick faces and immaculate
white-stone doorsteps;
And the gabled houses of the Dutch, with their
high stoops and iron railings,
(I can see their little brass knobs shining in the
morning sunlight);
And the solid houses of the descendants of the
Puritans,
Fronting the street with their narrow doors and
dormer-windows;
And the triple-galleried, many-pillared mansions
of Charleston,
Standing sideways in their gardens full of roses
and magnolias.
Yes, they are all dear to my heart, and in my
eyes they are beautiful;
For under their roofs were nourished the thoughts
that have made the nation;
The glory and strength of America came from
her ancestral dwellings.
FRANCIS MAKEMIE
(Presbyter of Christ in America, 1683-1708)
To thee, plain hero of a rugged race,
We bring the meed of praise too long delayed!
Thy fearless word and faithful work have made
For God's Republic firmer path and place
In this New World: thou hast proclaimed the
grace
And power of Christ in many a forest glade,
Teaching the truth that leaves men unafraid
Of frowning tyranny or death's dark face.
Oh, who can tell how much we owe to thee,
Makemie, and to labour such as thine,
For all that makes America the shrine
Of faith untrammeled and of conscience free?
Stand here, grey stone, and consecrate the sod
Where rests this brave Scotch-Irish man of God!
NATIONAL MONUMENTS
Count not the cost of honour to the dead!
The tribute that a mighty nation pays
To those who loved her well in former days
Means more than gratitude for glories fled;
For every noble man that she hath bred,
Lives in the bronze and marble that we raise,
Immortalized by art's immortal praise,
To lead our sons as he our fathers led.
These monuments of manhood strong and high
Do more than forts or battle-ships to keep
Our dear-bought liberty. They fortify
The heart of youth with valour wise and deep;
They build eternal bulwarks, and command
Eternal strength to guard our native land.
IN PRAISE OF POETS
MOTHER EARTH
Mother of all the high-strung poets and
singers departed,
Mother of all the grass that weaves over their
graves the glory of the field,
Mother of all the manifold forms of life, deep-
bosomed, patient, impassive,
Silent brooder and nurse of lyrical joys and sor-
rows!
Out of thee, yea, surely out of the fertile depth
below thy breast,
Issued in some Strange way, thou lying motion-
less, voiceless,
All these songs of nature, rhythmical, passionate,
yearning,
Coming in music from earth, but not unto earth
returning.
Dust are the blood-red hearts that beat in time
to these measures,
Thou hast taken them back to thyself, secretly,
irresistibly
Drawing the crimson currents of life down, down,
down
Deep into thy bosom again, as a river is lost in
the sand.
But the souls of the singers have entered into
the songs that revealed them,--
Passionate songs, immortal songs of joy and
grief and love and longing:
Floating from heart to heart of thy children, they
echo above thee:
Do they not utter thy heart, the voices of those
that love thee?
Long hadst thou lain like a queen transformed by
some old enchantment
Into an alien shape, mysterious, beautiful, speech-
less,
Knowing not who thou wert, till the touch of thy
Lord and Lover
Working within thee awakened the man-child to
breathe thy secret.
All of thy flowers and birds and forests and flow-
ing waters
Are but enchanted forms to embody the life of
the spirit;
Thou thyself, earth-mother, in mountain and
meadow and ocean,
Holdest the poem of God, eternal thought and
emotion.
MILTON
I
Lover of beauty, walking on the height
Of pure philosophy and tranquil song;
Born to behold the visions that belong
To those who dwell in melody and light;
Milton, thou spirit delicate and bright!
What drew thee down to join the Roundhead
throng
Of iron-sided warriors, rude and strong,
Fighting for freedom in a world half night?