Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Wilcox Pages1 2 3

Smoke

Last summer, lazing by the sea,
   I met a most entrancing creature,
Her black eyes quite bewildered me---
   She had a Spanish cast of feature.

She often smoked a cigarette,
   And did it in the cutest fashion.
Before a week passed by she set
   My young heart in a raging passion.

I swore I loved her as my life,
   I gave her gems (don't tell my tailor).
She promised to become my wife,
   But whispered, 'Papa is my jailer.'

'We must be very sly, you see,
   For Papa will not list to reason.
You must not come to call on me
   Until he's gone from home a season.

'I'll send you word, now don't forget,
   Take this as pledge, I will remember.'
She gave me a perfumed cigarette,
   And turned and left me with September.

To-day she sent her 'cards' to me.
   'My presence asked' to see her marry
That millionaire old banker C---
   She has my 'presents,' so I'll tarry.

And still I feel a keen regret
   (About the jewels that I gave her)
I've smoked the little cigarette---
   It had a most delicious flavour.

Coleur de Rose

I want more lives in which to love
   This world so full of beauty,
I want more days to use the ways
   I know of doing duty;
I ask no greater joy than this
   (So much I am life's lover,)
When I reach age to turn the page
   And read the story over,
   (Oh love stay near!)

Oh rapturous promise of the Spring!
   Oh June fulfilling after!
If Autumns sigh, when Summers die,
   'Tis drowned in Winter's laughter.
Oh maiden dawns, oh wifely noons,
   Oh siren sweet, sweet nights,
I'd want no heaven could earth be given
   Again with its delights,
   (If love stayed near!)

There are such glories for the eye,
   Such pleasures for the ear,
The senses reel with all they feel
   And see and taste and hear;
There are such ways of doing good,
   Such ways of being kind,
And bread that's cast on waters fast
   Comes home again, I find.
   (Oh love stay near.)

There are such royal souls to know,
   There is so much to learn,
While secrets rest in Nature's breast
   And unnamed stars still burn.
God toiled six days to make this earth,
   I think the good folks say---
Six lives we need to give full meed
   Of praise---one for each day,
   (If love stay near.)

But oh! if love fled far away,
   Or veiled his face from me,
One life too much, why then were such
   A life as this would be.
With sullen May and blighted June
   Blurred dawn and haggard night,
This dear old world in space were hurled
   If love lent not his light.
   (Oh love stay near.)

Last Love

The first flower of the spring is not so fair
Or bright, as one the ripe midsummer brings.
The first faint note the forest warbler sings
Is not as rich with feeling, or so rare
As when, full master of his art, the air
Drowns in the liquid sea of song he flings
Like silver spray from beak, and breast, and wings.
The artist's earliest effort wrought with care,
The bard's first ballad, written in his tears,
Set by his later toil seems poor and tame.
And into nothing dwindles at the test.
So with the passions of maturer years
Let those who will demand the first fond flame,
Give me the heart's last love, for that is best.

Love's Supremacy

As yon great Sun in his supreme condition
   Absorbs small worlds and makes them all his own,
So does my love absorb each vain ambition
   Each outside purpose which my life has known.
Stars cannot shine so near that vast orb's splendor,
   They are content to feed his flames of fire;
And so my heart is satisfied to render
   Its strength, its all, to meet thy strong desire.

As in a forest when dead leaves are falling,
   From all save some perennial green tree,
So one by one I find all pleasures palling
   That are not linked with or enjoyed by thee.
And all the homage that the world may proffer,
   I take as perfumed oils or incense sweet,
And think of it as one thing more to offer
   And sacrifice to Love, at thy dear feet.

I love myself because thou art my lover,
   My name seems dear since uttered by thy voice;
Yet argus-eyed I watch and would discover
   Each blemish in the object of thy choice.
I coldly sit in judgment on each error,
   To my soul's gaze I hold each fault of me,
Until my pride is lost in abject terror,
   Lest I become inadequate to thee.

Like some swift-rushing and sea-seeking river,
   Which gathers force the farther on it goes,
So does the current of my love forever
   Find added strength and beauty as it flows.
The more I give, the more remains for giving,
   The more receive, the more remains to win.
Ah! only in eternities of living
   Will life be long enough to love thee in.

Fame

If I should die, to-day,
To-morrow, maybe, the world would see 
Would waken from sleep, and say,
"Why here was talent! why here was worth!
Why here was a luminous light o' the earth.
                A soul as free
                As the winds of the sea:
                To whom was given
                A dower of heaven.
And fame, and name, and glory belongs
To this dead singer of living songs.
Bring hither a wreath, for the bride of death!"
And so they would praise me, and so they would raise me
   Mayhap, a column, high over the bed
   Where I should be lying, all cold and dead.

     But I am a living poet!
     Walking abroad in the sunlight of God,
     Not lying asleep, where the clay worms creep,
         And the cold world will not show it,
E'en when it sees that my song should please;
But sneering says:  "Avaunt, with thy lays
Do not sing them, and do not bring them
    Into this rustling, bustling life.
We have no time, for a jingling rhyme,
In this scene of hurrying, worrying strife."
    And so I say, there is but one way
To win me a name, and bring me fame.
And that is, to die, and be buried low,
When the world would praise me, an hour or so.

HHer mother's beautiful eyes/P>

I met a young girl on the street;
  I was a stranger to her, no more.
  But the glance of her brown eyes, shy and sweet,
    Set me to dreaming of days of yore.
         Ah!shedoes not know, but long ago
When life was as cloudless as June's blue skies,
Hermother
 was all the world to me;
         And she
Has her mother's beautiful eyes.

She lifted her lashes, and let them fall;
  Raised them and dropped them as I past by.
A grizzled old stranger, that was all
  She saw, for she could not know that I
       In the dear, dear past
       Too sweet to last
Had found my Eden, my paradise,
In her mother's beautiful eyes.

I loved, and was loved. But a word was said
    In thoughtless jest, and the work was done.
The hopes I had cherished, lay blasted, dead--  
    My rival pleaded his suit, and won.
And their child-ah me! is fair to see;
I wonder if she's as good and wise,
As sweet and kind, and pure of mind
As the one who bequeathed her those beautiful eyes.

She has her father's step, and air.
  Her father's brow, and his pale, dark cheek,
And her father's tawny, curling hair,
    And her father's mouth, half sweet, half weak.
         All very true.
And "she's like her father through and through,"
    I said when we met on the street that day,
    "And not like her mother in any way."
  Then I caught my breath with a start of surprise,
         (That she did not see)
For the child of my rival glanced up at me
  With her mother's beautiful eyes.

OLD TIMES.

Friend of my youth, let us talk of old times;
  Of the long lost golden hours.
When "Winter" meant only Christmas chimes,
  And "Summer" wreaths of flowers.
Life has grown old, and cold, my friend,
  And the winter now, means death.
And summer blossoms speak all too plain
  Of the dear, dead forms beneath.

But let us talk of the past to-night;
  And live it over again,
We will put the long years out of sight,
  And dream we are young as then.
But you must not look at me, my friend,
  And I must not look at you,
Or the furrowed brows, and silvered locks,
  Will prove our dream untrue.

Let us sing of the summer, too sweet to last,
  And yet too sweet to die.
Let us read tales, from the book of the past,
  And talk of the days gone by.
We will turn our backs to the West, my friend,
  And forget we are growing old.
The skies of the Present are dull, and gray,
  But the Past's are blue, and gold.

The sun has passed over the noontide line
  And is sinking down the West.
And of friends we knew in days Lang Syne,
  Full half have gone to rest.
And the few that are left on earth, my friend
  Are scattered far, and wide.
But you and I will talk of the days
  Ere any roamed, or died.

Auburn ringlets, and hazel eyes
  Blue eyes and tresses of gold.
Winds joy laden, and azure skies,
  Belong to those days of old.
We will leave the Present's shores awhile
  And float on the Past's smooth sea.
But I must not look at you, my friend,
  And you must not look at me.