The Cremation of Sam McGee
by Robert Service (1874-1958)

There are strange things done in the midnight sun
⁠      By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
⁠      That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
⁠      But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
⁠      I cremated Sam McGee.

Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam ’round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he’d often say in his homely way that “he’d sooner live in hell.”

On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way over the Dawson trail.
Talk of your cold! through the parka’s fold it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn’t see;
It wasn’t much fun, but the only one to whimper was Sam McGee.

And that very night, as we lay packed tight in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o’erhead were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and “Cap,” says he, “I’ll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I’m asking that you won’t refuse my last request.”

Well, he seemed so low that I couldn’t say no; then he says with a sort of moan:
“It’s the cursed cold, and it’s got right hold till I’m chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet ’tain’t being dead—it’s my awful dread of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair, you’ll cremate my last remains.”

A pal’s last need is a thing to heed, so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee.

There wasn’t a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn’t get rid, because of a promise given;
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say: “You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it’s up to you to cremate those last remains.”

Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows—O God! how I loathed the thing.

And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I’d often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.

Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the “Alice May.”
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then “Here,” said I, with a sudden cry, “is my cre-ma-tor-eum.”

Some planks I tore from the cabin floor, and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around, and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared, and the furnace roared—such a blaze you seldom see;
And I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal, and I stuffed in Sam McGee.

Then I made a hike, for I didn’t like to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled, and the wind began to blow.
It was icy cold, but the hot sweat rolled down my cheeks, and I don’t know why;
And the greasy smoke in an inky cloak went streaking down the sky.

I do not know how long in the snow I wrestled with grisly fear;
But the stars came out and they danced about ere again I ventured near;
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said: “I’ll just take a peep inside.
I guess he’s cooked, and it’s time I looked”; . . . then the door I opened wide.

And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile, and he said: “Please close that door.
It’s fine in here, but I greatly fear you’ll let in the cold and storm—
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it’s the first time I’ve been warm.”

There are strange things done in the midnight sun
⁠      By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
⁠      That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
⁠      But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
⁠      I cremated Sam McGee.

Views: 35

The Apparition
by John Donne (1572-1631)

When by thy scorn, O murd’ress, I am dead
      And that thou think’st thee free
From all solicitation from me,
Then shall my ghost come to thy bed,
And thee, feign’d vestal, in worse arms shall see;
Then thy sick taper will begin to wink,
And he, whose thou art then, being tir’d before,
Will, if thou stir, or pinch to wake him, think
      Thou call’st for more,
And in false sleep will from thee shrink;
And then, poor aspen wretch, neglected thou
Bath’d in a cold quicksilver sweat wilt lie
      A verier ghost than I.
What I will say, I will not tell thee now,
Lest that preserve thee; and since my love is spent,
I’had rather thou shouldst painfully repent,
Than by my threat’nings rest still innocent.

Views: 33

Incarnation
by John Dos Passos (1896-1970)

Incessantly the long rain falls,
Slanting on black walls,
Which glisten gold where a street lamp shines.

In a shop-window, spangled in long lines,
By rain-drops all a-glow,
An Italian woman’s face
Flames into my soul as I go
Hastily by in the turbulent darkness;—
An oval olive face,
With the sweetly sullen grace
Of the Virgin when first she sees,
Amid her garden’s silver lilies,
The white-robed angel gleam,
And softly, as by a sultry dream,
Feels all her soul subdued unto the fire
And radiance of her ecstasy.
So in some picture, on which as on a lyre,
An old Italian painter laboriously has played
His soul away, his love, all his desire
For fragrant things afar from earth,
Shines the Madonna, as with a veil overlaid
By incense-smoke and dust age-old,
At whose feet, in time of dearth
Or need, a myriad men have laid
Their sorrows and arisen bold.

Incessantly the long rain falls,
Slanting on black walls.
But through the dark interminable streets,
Along pavements where rain beats
Its sharp tattoo, and gas-lamps shine,
Greenish gold in the solitude,
The vision flames through my mood
Of that Italian woman’s face,
Through the dripping window-pane.

Views: 33

The Lover’s Liturgy
by Jack London (1876-1916)

Ah! my brothers, we are mortals,
   Atoms on Time’s ebb and flow,
Soon we pass the dreary portals,
   Soon to dreamless sleep we go;
We are sparkles, evanescent,
   Doomed to perish in the hour,
And our time is in the present,
   Ours but a moment’s power.

Love, my brothers, is the essence,
   In the scheme of life and light;
Birth and death are fearful lessons –
   Out of darkness into night, –
Thus we flash, a moment’s living,
   ’Twixt the silent walls of death,
Flashing for a moment, giving
   Song but for a moment’s breath.

Then that moment do not sadden,
   Prayers, nor beads, nor aves tell;
Then that moment do not madden
   With mad dreams of heaven or hell;
Trust that he who cast you idly,
   Asked of you nor aye nor nay,
Flung you idly, wildly, widely,
   For his whim will not ask pay.

For a whim of bubble-blowing,
   Perhaps to while an empty day,
For a whim of stubble-sowing,
   For a game at godlike play,
Shall the bubbles in the drifting,
   Pay the whim of Him who played?
Shall the seedlets in the shifting,
   Of the sifter be afraid?

Shall the playthings of a master,
   Falling idly from his hand,
Meet meritless disaster,
   Meet with unearned reprimand?
Shall the children of fancy,
   Born a certain race to run,
By an absurd necromancy,
   Penance pay when it is done?

O, my brothers, go not questing
   For some mystic grail in vain—
Why should ye a Master’s jesting,
   Strive to fathom or make plain?
Wake ye from your fevered dreaming,
   Groping for forbidden toys,
All about you life is teeming,
   Singing of ungarnered joys.

Surely He who somewhere hovers,
   ’Yond the reach of mortal ken,
Gazing down on love and lovers,
   Cannot blame the sons of men;
Cannot blame his bubbles bursting,
   Heart to heart and lips to lips;
Cannot blame his seedlets thirsting
   For the dew of honeyed lips.

Then again the golden chalice,
   Once again a lingering draught;
Surely He will bear no malice
   For the pledge divinely quaffed.
Thus, with sweet and fond caresses,
   Hearts that beat with mutual bliss,
He who loves is he who blesses,
   Sealing heaven with a kiss.

Views: 37

⁠

The Song in Camp
by Bayard Taylor (1825-1878)

“Give us a song!” the soldiers cried,
      The outer trenches guarding,
When the heated guns of the camps allied
⁠      Grew weary of bombarding.

The dark Redan, in silent scoff,
⁠      Lay, grim and threatening, under;
And the tawny mound of the Malakoff
⁠      No longer belched its thunder.

There was a pause. A guardsman said,
⁠      “We storm the forts to-morrow;
Sing while we may, another day
⁠      Will bring enough of sorrow.”

They lay along the battery’s side,
⁠      Below the smoking cannon:
Brave hearts, from Severn and from Clyde,
⁠      And from the banks of Shannon.

They sang of love, and not of fame;
⁠      Forgot was Britain’s glory:
Each heart recalled a different name,
⁠      But all sang “Annie Laurie.”

Voice after voice caught up the song,
⁠      Until its tender passion
Rose like an anthem, rich and strong,—
⁠      Their battle-eve confession.

Dear girl, her name he dared not speak,
⁠      But, as the song grew louder,
Something upon the soldier’s cheek
⁠      Washed off the stains of powder.

Beyond the darkening ocean burned
⁠      The bloody sunset’s embers,
While the Crimean valleys learned
⁠      How English love remembers.

And once again a fire of hell
⁠      Rained on the Russian quarters,
With scream of shot, and burst of shell,
⁠      And bellowing of the mortars!

And Irish Nora’s eyes are dim
⁠      For a singer, dumb and gory;
And English Mary mourns for him
⁠      Who sang of “Annie Laurie.”

Sleep, soldiers! still in honoured rest
⁠      Your truth and valour wearing:
The bravest are the tenderest,—
⁠      The loving are the daring.

Views: 35

Wonder and Joy
by Robinson Jeffers (1887-1962)

The things that one grows tired of—O, be sure
They are only foolish artificial things!
Can a bird ever tire of having wings?
And I, so long as life and sense endure,
(Or brief be they!) shall nevermore inure
My heart to the recurrence of the springs,
Of gray dawns, the gracious evenings,
The infinite wheeling stars. A wonder pure
Must ever well within me to behold
Venus decline; or great Orion, whose belt
Is studded with three nails of burning gold,
Ascend the winter heaven. Who never felt
This wondering joy may yet be good or great:
But envy him not: he is not fortunate.

Views: 43

To the River Lodon
by Thomas Warton (1728-1790)

Ah! what a weary race my feet have run
   Since first I trod thy banks with alders crowned,
   And thought my way was all thro’ fairy ground,
Beneath thy azure sky and golden sun;
Where first my muse to lisp her notes begun!
   While pensive Memory traces back the round,
Which fills the varied interval between;
Much pleasure, more of sorrow, marks the scene.
Sweet native stream! those skies and suns so pure
   No more return, to cheer my evening road!
Yet still one joy remains, that, not obscure,
   Nor useless, all my vacant days have flowed,
From youth’s gay dawn to manhood’s prime mature;
   Nor with the muse’s laurel unbestowed.

Views: 26

Himna slobodi
by Ivan Gundulić (1589-1638)

O lijepa, o draga, o slatka slobodo,
dar u kôm sva blaga višnji nam Bog je dô,
uzroče istini od naše sve slave,
uresu jedini od ove Dubrave,
sva srebra, sva zlata, svi ljudcki životi
ne mogu bit plata tvôj čistoj ljepoti!

Views: 35

The Sick Child’s Dream
by Robert Nicoll (1814-1837)

O! mither, mither, my head was sair,
   And my een wi’ tears were weet;
But the pain has gane for evermair,
   Sae, mither, dinna greet:
And I ha’e had sic a bonnie dream,
   Since last asleep I fell,
O’ a’ that is holy an’ guid to name,
   That I’ve wauken’d my dream to tell.

I thought on the morn o’ a simmer day
   That awa’ through the clouds I flew,
While my silken hair did wavin’ play
   ’Mang breezes steep’d in dew;
And the happy things o’ life and light
   Were around my gowden way,
As they stood in their parent Heaven’s sight
   In the hames o’ nightless day.

An’ sangs o’ love that nae tongue may tell,
   Frae their hearts cam’ flowin’ free,
Till the starns stood still, while alang did swell
   The plaintive melodie;
And ane o’ them sang wi’ my mither’s voice,
   Till through my heart did gae
That chanted hymn o’ my bairnhood’s choice
   Sae dowie, saft, an’ wae.

Thae happy things o’ the glorious sky
   Did lead me far away,
Where the stream o’ life rins never dry,
   Where naething kens decay;
And they laid me down in a mossy bed,
   Wi’ curtains o’ spring leaves green,
And the name o’ God they praying said,
   And a light came o’er my een.

And I saw the earth that I had left,
   And I saw my mither there;
And I saw her grieve that she was bereft
   O’ the bairn she thought sae fair;
And I saw her pine till her spirit fled—
   Like a bird to its young one’s nest—
To that land of love; and my head was laid
   Again on my mither’s breast.

And, mither, ye took me by the hand,
   As ye were wont to do;
And your loof, sae saft and white, I fand
   Laid on my caller brow;
And my lips you kiss’d, and my curling hair
   You round your fingers wreath’d;
And I kent that a happy mither’s prayer
   Was o’er me silent breath’d—

And we wander’d through that happy land,
   That was gladly glorious a’;
The dwellers there were an angel-band,
   And their voices o’ love did fa’
On our ravish’d ears like the deein’ tones
   O’ an anthem far away,
In a starn-lit hour, when the woodland moans
   That its green is turn’d to grey.

And, mither, amang the sorrowless there,
   We met my brithers three,
And your bonnie May, my sister fair,
   And a happy bairn was she;
And she led me awa’ ’mang living flowers,
   As on earth she aft has done;
And thegither we sat in the holy bowers
   Where the blessed rest aboon;—

And she tauld me I was in paradise,
   Where God in love doth dwell—
Where the weary rest, and the mourner’s voice
   Forgets its warld-wail;
And she tauld me they kent na dule nor care:
   And bade me be glad to dee,
That yon sinless land and the dwellers there
   Might be hame and kin to me.

Then sweetly a voice came on my ears,
   And it sounded sae holily,
That my heart grew saft, and blabs o’ tears
   Sprung up in my sleepin’ e’e;
And my inmost soul was sairly moved
   Wi’ its mair than mortal joy;—
’Twas the voice o’ Him who bairnies loved
   That wauken’d your dreamin’ boy!

Views: 46

Fog
by Carl Sandburg (1878-1967)

The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

Views: 37