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Even-Song.

by Oliver Wendell Holmes

It may be, yes, it must be, Time that brings

An end to mortal things,

That sends the beggar Winter in the train

Of Autumn's burdened wain, -

Time, that is heir of all our earthly state,

And knoweth well to wait

Till sea hath turned to shore and shore to sea,

If so it need must be,

Ere he make good his claim and call his own

Old empires overthrown, -

Time, who can find no heavenly orb too large

To hold its fee in charge,

Nor any motes that fill its beam so small,

But he shall care for all, -

It may be, must be, - yes, he soon shall tire

This hand that holds the lyre.

Then ye who listened in that earlier day

When to my careless lay

I matched its chords and stole their first-born thrill,

With untaught rudest skill

Vexing a treble from the slender strings

Thin as the locust sings

When the shrill-crying child of summer's heat

Pipes from its leafy seat,

The dim pavilion of embowering green

Beneath whose shadowy screen

The small sopranist tries his single note

Against the song-bird's throat,

And all the echoes listen, but in vain;

They hear no answering strain, -

Then ye who listened in that earlier day

Shall sadly turn away,

Saying, "The fire burns low, the hearth is cold

That warmed our blood of old;

Cover its embers and its half-burnt brands,

And let us stretch our hands

Over a brighter and fresh-kindled flame;

Lo, this is not the same,

The joyous singer of our morning time,

Flushed high with lusty rhyme!

Speak kindly, for he bears a human heart,

But whisper him apart, -

Tell him the woods their autumn robes have shed

And all their birds have fled,

And shouting winds unbuild the naked nests

They warmed with patient breasts;

Tell him the sky is dark, the summer o'er,

And bid him sing no more!"

Ah, welladay! if words so cruel-kind

A listening ear might find!

But who that hears the music in his soul

Of rhythmic waves that roll

Crested with gleams of fire, and as they flow

Stir all the deeps below

Till the great pearls no calm might ever reach

Leap glistening on the beach, -

Who that has known the passion and the pain,

The rush through heart and brain,

The joy so like a pang his hand is pressed

Hard on his throbbing breast,

When thou, whose smile is life and bliss and fame

Hast set his pulse aflame,

Muse of the lyre! can say farewell to thee?

Alas! and must it be?

In many a clime, in many a stately tongue,

The mighty bards have sung;

To these the immemorial thrones belong

And purple robes of song;

Yet the slight minstrel loves the slender tone

His lips may call his own,

And finds the measure of the verse more sweet,

Timed by his pulse's beat,

Than all the hymnings of the laurelled throng.

Say not I do him wrong,

For Nature spoils her warblers, - them she feeds

In lotus-growing meads

And pours them subtle draughts from haunted streams

That fill their souls with dreams.

Full well I know the gracious mother's wiles

And dear delusive smiles!

No callow fledgling of her singing brood

But tastes that witching food,

And hearing overhead the eagle's wing,

And how the thrushes sing,

Vents his exiguous chirp, and from his nest

Flaps forth - we know the rest.

I own the weakness of the tuneful kind, -

Are not all harpers blind?

I sang too early, must I sing too late?

The lengthening shadows wait

The first pale stars of twilight, - yet how sweet

The flattering whisper's cheat, -

"Thou hast the fire no evening chill can tame,

Whose coals outlast its flame!"

Farewell, ye carols of the laughing morn,

Of earliest sunshine born!

The sower flings the seed and looks not back

Along his furrowed track;

The reaper leaves the stalks for other hands

To gird with circling bands;

The wind, earth's careless servant, truant-born,

Blows clean the beaten corn

And quits the thresher's floor, and goes his way

To sport with ocean's spray;

The headlong-stumbling rivulet scrambling down

To wash the sea-girt town,

Still babbling of the green and billowy waste

Whose salt he longs to taste,

Ere his warm wave its chilling clasp may feel

Has twirled the miller's wheel.

The song has done its task that makes us bold

With secrets else untold, -

And mine has run its errand; through the dews

I tracked the flying Muse;

The daughter of the morning touched my lips

With roseate finger-tips;

Whether I would or would not, I must sing

With the new choirs of spring;

Now, as I watch the fading autumn day

And trill my softened lay,

I think of all that listened, and of one

For whom a brighter sun

Dawned at high summer's noon. Ah, comrades dear,

Are not all gathered here?

Our hearts have answered. - Yes! they hear our call:

All gathered here! all! all!