Shapes of Clay

IN THE BINNACLE.

The Church possesses the unerring compass whose needle points directly and persistently to the star of the eternal law of God.

Religious Weekly.

  The Church's compass, if you please,
  Has two or three (or more) degrees
    Of variation;
  And many a soul has gone to grief
  On this or that or t'other reef
  Through faith unreckoning or brief
    Miscalculation.
  Misguidance is of perils chief
    To navigation.
  The obsequious thing makes, too, you'll mark,
  Obeisance through a little arc
    Of declination;
  For Satan, fearing witches, drew
  From Death's pale horse, one day, a shoe,
  And nailed it to his door to undo
    Their machination.
  Since then the needle dips to woo
    His habitation.

HUMILITY.

  Great poets fire the world with fagots big
    That make a crackling racket,
  But I'm content with but a whispering twig
    To warm some single jacket.

ONE PRESIDENT.

  "What are those, father?" "Statesmen, my child—
  Lacrymose, unparliamentary, wild."
  "What are they that way for, father?" "Last fall,
  'Our candidate's better,' they said, 'than all!'"
  "What did they say he was, father?" "A man
  Built on a straight incorruptible plan—
  Believing that none for an office would do
  Unless he were honest and capable too."
  "Poor gentlemen—so disappointed!" "Yes, lad,
  That is the feeling that's driving them mad;
  They're weeping and wailing and gnashing because
  They find that he's all that they said that he was."

THE BRIDE.

  "You know, my friends, with what a brave carouse
  I made a second marriage in my house—
    Divorced old barren Reason from my bed
  And took the Daughter of the Vine to spouse."
  So sang the Lord of Poets. In a gleam
  Of light that made her like an angel seem,
    The Daughter of the Vine said: "I myself
  Am Reason, and the Other was a Dream."

STRAINED RELATIONS.

  Says England to Germany: "Africa's ours."
    Says Germany: "Ours, I opine."
  Says Africa: "Tell me, delectable Pow'rs,
    What is it that ought to be mine?"

THE MAN BORN BLIND.

  A man born blind received his sight
    By a painful operation;
  And these are things he saw in the light
    Of an infant observation.
  He saw a merchant, good and wise.
    And greatly, too, respected,
  Who looked, to those imperfect eyes,
    Like a swindler undetected.
  He saw a patriot address
    A noisy public meeting.
  And said: "Why, that's a calf. I guess.
    That for the teat is bleating."
  A doctor stood beside a bed
    And shook his summit sadly.
  "O see that foul assassin!" said
    The man who saw so badly.
  He saw a lawyer pleading for
    A thief whom they'd been jailing,
  And said: "That's an accomplice, or
    My sight again is failing."
  Upon the Bench a Justice sat,
    With nothing to restrain him;
  "'Tis strange," said the observer, "that
    They ventured to unchain him."
  With theologic works supplied,
    He saw a solemn preacher;
  "A burglar with his kit," he cried,
    "To rob a fellow creature."
  A bluff old farmer next he saw
    Sell produce in a village,
  And said: "What, what! is there no law
    To punish men for pillage?"
  A dame, tall, fair and stately, passed,
    Who many charms united;
  He thanked his stars his lot was cast
    Where sepulchers were whited.
  He saw a soldier stiff and stern,
    "Full of strange oaths" and toddy;
  But was unable to discern
    A wound upon his body.
  Ten square leagues of rolling ground
    To one great man belonging,
  Looked like one little grassy mound
    With worms beneath it thronging.
  A palace's well-carven stones,
    Where Dives dwelt contented,
  Seemed built throughout of human bones
    With human blood cemented.
  He watched the yellow shining thread
    A silk-worm was a-spinning;
  "That creature's coining gold." he said,
    "To pay some girl for sinning."
  His eyes were so untrained and dim
    All politics, religions,
  Arts, sciences, appeared to him
    But modes of plucking pigeons.
  And so he drew his final breath,
    And thought he saw with sorrow
  Some persons weeping for his death
    Who'd be all smiles to-morrow.

A NIGHTMARE.

  I dreamed that I was dead. The years went by:
  The world forgot that such a man as I
    Had ever lived and written: other names
  Were hailed with homage, in their turn to die.
  Out of my grave a giant beech upgrew.
  Its roots transpierced my body, through and through,
    My substance fed its growth. From many lands
  Men came in troops that giant tree to view.
  'T was sacred to my memory and fame—
  My monument. But Allen Forman came,
    Filled with the fervor of a new untruth,
  And carved upon the trunk his odious name!