Verses from the Prose Works

FROM THE UNPUBLISHED PAPERS OF MCINTOSH

JELLALUDIN

By the hoof of the Wild Goat uptossed
From the Cliff where She lay in the Sun,
Fell the Stone

To the Tarn where the daylight is lost;
So She fell from the light of the Sun,
And alone.

Now the fall was ordained from the first,
With the Goat and the Cliff and the Tarn,
But the Stone

Knows only Her life is accursed,

As She sinks in the depths of the Tarn,
And alone.

Oh, Thou who hast builded the world!
Oh, Thou who hast lighted the Sun!
Oh, Thou who hast darkened the Tarn!
Judge Thou

The sin of the Stone that was hurled
By the Goat from the light of the Sun,
As She sinks in the mire of the Tarn,

Even now-even now — even now!

THE PARABLE OF CHAJJU BHAGAT
The World hath set its heavy yoke
Upon the old white-bearded folk

Who strive to please the King.
God's mercy is upon the young,
God's wisdom in the baby tongue
That fears not anything.

A MAHRATta Laonee

Their warrior forces Chimnajee
Before the Peishwa led,

The Children of the Sun and Fire

Behind him turned and fled.

(Chorus.)

With them there fought who rides so free
With sword and turban red,

The warrior-youth who earns his fee
At peril of his head.

BEONI BAR

It was not in the open fight
We threw away the sword,
But in the lonely watching

In the darkness by the ford.

The waters lapped, the night-wind blew,
Full-armed the Fear was born and grew,
And we were flying ere we knew
From panic in the night.

THE CONVERT

Look, you have cast out Love! What Gods are these

You bid me please?

The Three in One, the One in Three? Not so!

To my own Gods I go.

It may be they shall give me greater ease

Than your cold Christ and tangled Trinities.

Verses from the Prose Works

THE PEORA HUNT

Pit where the buffalo cooled his hide,

By the hot sun emptied, and blistered and dried;
Log in the reh-grass, hidden and lone;

Bund where the earth-rat's mounds are strown;
Cave in the bank where the sly stream steals;
Aloe that stabs at the belly and heels,

Jump if you dare on a steed untried-
Safer it is to go wide

go wide!

Hark, from in front where the best men ride: "Pull to the off, boys! Wide! Go wide!"

THE OLD SHIKAREE

Go, stalk the red deer o'er the heather;
Ride, follow the fox, if you can!
But, for pleasure and profit together,

Allow me the hunting of Man,

The chase of the Human, the search for the Soul
To its ruin, the hunting of Man.

FROM THE DUSK TO THe Dawn

A stone's throw out on either hand
From that well-ordered road we tread,

And all the world is wild and strange;
Churel and ghoul and Djinn and sprite
Shall bear us company to-night,

For we have reached the Oldest Land

Wherein the Powers of Darkness range.

Churel: Demon.

Djinn: Genii.

THE CHARM OF THE BISARA

Little Blind Fish, thou art marvelous wise;
Little Blind Fish, who put out thy eyes?
Open thine ears while I whisper my wish:
Bring me a lover, thou little Blind Fish.

IN LEONEE

The wolf cub at even lay hid in the corn,
When the smoke of the cooking hung gray;
He knew where the doe made a couch for her fawn.
And he looked to his strength for his prey.

But the moon swept the smoke wreaths away, And he turned from his meal in the villager's close, And he bayed to the moon as she rose.

GYPSY SONG

The wild hawk to the wind-swept sky,
The deer to the wholesome wold,
And the heart of man to the heart of a maid,
As it was in the days of old.

OATTA'S STORY

Then a pile of heads he laid

Thirty thousand heaped on high

All to please the Kafir maid,

Where the Oxus ripples by.

Grimly spake Atulla Khan:

"Love hath made this thing a Man."

Verses from the Prose Works

LUCIA

Soft on thy tomb shall fond Remembrance shed
The warm, yet unavailing tear,

And purple flowers that deck the honored dead
Shall strew the loved and honored bier.

What needs the emblem, what the plaintive strain,
What all the arts that sculpture e'er expressed,
To tell the treasure that these walls contain ?
Let those declare it most who knew her best.

The tender pity she would oft display,

Shall be with interest at her shrine returned, Connubial love, connubial tears repay,

And Lucia loved shall still be Lucia mourned.

Though closed the lips, though stopped the tuneful breath

The silent, clay-cold monitress shall teachIn all the alarming eloquence of death,

With double pathos to the heart shall preach.

Shall teach the virtuous maid, the faithful wife,
If young and fair, that young and fair was she,
Then close the useful lesson of her life,

And tell them what she is they soon must be.