* A Distributed Proofreaders Canada Ebook * This ebook is made available at no cost and with very few restrictions. These restrictions apply only if (1) you make a change in the ebook (other than alteration for different display devices), or (2) you are making commercial use of the ebook. If either of these conditions applies, please check with an FP administrator before proceeding. This work is in the Canadian public domain, but may be under copyright in some countries. If you live outside Canada, check your country's copyright laws. IF THE BOOK IS UNDER COPYRIGHT IN YOUR COUNTRY, DO NOT DOWNLOAD OR REDISTRIBUTE THIS FILE. Title: Sanctuary. Sunshine House Sonnets. Author: Carman, Bliss [William Bliss] (1861-1929) Date of first publication: 1929 Edition used as base for this ebook: Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1929 Date first posted: 7 October 2010 Date last updated: August 26, 2014 Faded Page ebook#20140888 This ebook was produced by: Al Haines TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: The illustrations have not been included in this etext because their copyright status could not be determined. The source book did not have a Table of Contents. One has been added for the reader's convenience. SANCTUARY _SUNSHINE HOUSE SONNETS_ _By_ BLISS CARMAN _Illustrations by_ WHITMAN BAILEY MCCLELLAND & STEWART TORONTO 1929 PRINTED IN THE U. S. A. CONTENTS The Dreamer Escape Mew Moon I, II Sorcery Spring, Dancing A Bluebird in March I, II, III Early Spring The Flute of Gold The Wood Thrush I, II, III June Leisure From the Door of Heaven White Iris I, II The Bather Early Summer Harvest Bluebird in October The Magic Maker Indian Summer November Sunset Autumn Closing Chrysanthemums Wild Geese The Winter Scene I, II, III, IV Sanctuary Star! The Yule Tree New Year's Eve The Sun Room Buddha I, II, III A Fantasy Five Mile River Conclusion SANCTUARY THE DREAMER Whence came the sweet insurgence of the Spring That loosed the wild bird songs, the willow buds, The twilight chorus in the marsh, and shone Within the visionary soul of Man?... When we behold in August on a day The goldenrod upon a thousand trails, The asters in blue drifts through clearings wild, And every roadside gay with meadow rue-- The poet's recompense and traveller's joy-- When, thrilled by beauty passing thought, we sense That harmony which is the artist's peace And presage of creation, then we know One walked with love among the misty hills In a gray cloak of rain, and dreamed a dream. ESCAPE Out of the turmoil whither shall I go? How cure the fever of a mind distraught, The crazed futility of haste assuage, And dear serenity's lost poise restore? Is there no respite for the racing pulse, No haven from the day's demoniac din And the relentless frenzy of the night? Where may the haunting peace of God be found? No cabined luxury contents the soul, Homesick for solace of its native air. For healing of the wind among the pines, The stilling beauty of the clear new moon, The strength of hills, the joy of singing streams, Take any road at hand, to Out-of-doors. NEW MOON I How many a time have we not seen with joy The new moon in the West, the longed-for sign Glory shall fail not with recurring time. Each month in flawless wonder reappears That miracle of light and fantasy-- The faithful lamp the Twilight Sibyl bears, Protectress of the fond in heart, who dwells Upon the borders of the sacred night. In April when the woodlands ring with song Or in December's leafless solitude, She comes to take away the fret of life And with sheer ecstasy set all things free; While the adoring soul in stillness waits, Love like the frailest windflower revives. II Ah, yes! For love is not a graven stone Nor sainted image cast in changeless bronze, To front the onslaughts of tempestuous time And the slow ravages of frost endure. It is more like a blossom of the field Springing in meadow corners unobserved Or from the common roadside in the dust, To be the marvel of the passer-by. Within the fallow of the heart there falls A chance-sown seed of glory on a day; Our rapture warms it like the kindly sun, Our tears of sorrow nourish it like rain; And there, as in our own door-yard, behold An immortal flower the Heavenly Gardener tends. SORCERY Under gray skies the mirror of the lake Reflects the misty flush of the young leaves. From its smooth lip the pastel woodlands rise In the soft-tinted loveliness of May Over the dark-stemmed brushwood Spring has thrown Her impalpable veil of changing green and red, Like an elusive sorceress who lays Her spell of wonder on a waiting world. And all her lovers who had half forgot Her beauty must arise and follow her, Enthralled as ever by her witchery. A breath of wind comes ruffling the smooth lake And strews the white plum-blossoms on the grass, Stirring old transports, and is still again. SPRING, DANCING Here April wanders from the rainy Sound-- Ethereal Beauty in her shining veil, Like a slow-dancing Sibyl comes with joy. Enraptured we behold her mystic form Gleam through the silvery showers against the hill, And must forever follow on her trace, Enchanted as in some old fairy tale By the enthralling sorceries of the earth. And hark, what music for her pomp is made In the awakening meadows, where the stream Murmurs at twilight when the moon is large, And through the alders in the marshy ground Rises the watery treble of the frogs-- The eerie and haunted Pan-pipes of the Spring. A BLUEBIRD IN MARCH I When the sun shines upon the crust of March In the bare wood, how blue the shadows lie Along the snow between the gray tree-boles! And where the muffled stream runs, bluer still Between its snowy banks edged with frail ice, The silvery oaks and sugar maples stand Like a faint tracing on a lacquer tray, Or a worn pattern on old Sheffield plate. The strong sun melts the snow in open places; A calling crow flies over, trailing north His silent shadow down the wooded slope; And then to bring the winter scene to life, Etched on the memory like a haunting smile A bluebird flashes to an apple bough. II Now great Orion journeys to the West, The Lord of Winter from the world withdraws, And all his glittering house of cold dissolves. Ice-storm and crust and powdery drift are gone, And a soft hush of morning fills the world. In rocky groves the sugar maples drip, Till the sweet sap o'erbrims the shining pails; The snow slides from the roofs in the warm sun; Along spring-runs the first young green appears; The willow saplings in the meadow lot Put on their saffron veils with silver sheen As if for some approaching festival; And hark, from field to field one note proclaims The Phantasm of Spring is on the move! III It is the gladdening note our fathers heard In Puritan New England in old days, On Marchy mornings when the wind grew still, Telling them winter would not always last. How soft it falls, how plaintive yet how sure! Clear as a call from heaven, that cheery cry Heralds the reawakening of earth, And sets the frost-bound urge of life astir. Is he not of that blessed company To whom Saint Francis carried the new word-- Of Joyous resurrection and brave life-- The gospel of Victorious ecstasy? In the bright hush he pauses to repeat His canticle of transport undismayed. EARLY SPRING Now the soft rain comes over the blue hill, And the red-shouldered blackbird sounds his flute Along the meadows of the Silvermine. Between its willow banks the winding stream Is tinged with violet dusk, as the great moon Rises in splendor on the Eastern ridge, And through the twilight all the marshy ground Rings with the silver chorus of the frogs. In rocky groves the shy hepaticas Awake to don their softest blue once more, And troops of golden adder's-tongue return. In cool damp woods Jack-in-the-pulpit stands, And the dark trillium for a mystic sign; That all the old earth magic is renewed. THE FLUTE OF GOLD Just on the verge of summer, when the air Of our warm May is redolent with bloom Of honeysuckle and flaunting peonies And the white pear tree shedding spicy balm, With the first heat there falls a waiting hush,-- A faint sweet stillness, as if Nature swooned At the on-coming of her own desire, With sense of things too lovely to be borne. For the blue door of Heaven is left ajar, And all the dreamful ardor of the spring Is spent for rapture in a moment now. And where the dogwood spreads its drifts like snow Among the greenery of the forest dim, The first swamp-robin tries his flute of gold. THE WOOD THRUSH I When the May eve is soft with misty rain And all the world is hushed as in a trance, Save for a white-throat singing far away, The woods are tinged with purple in the dusk, Where Spring's green fire is smouldering into life. It surges to the tree-tops like a tide, Touches the peach trees at the garden's end, And burns among the tulips in cool flame. Ah, then we listen for the magic note We know must come with soul enchantment soon-- Clear as the mythic pipes men used to hear In wild Arcadian valleys long ago Haunting the woodlands with supernal cry-- The clear impassioned ecstasy of life. II Hark, from the twilit wood beyond the road, Those leisurely enraptured cadences Borne on the dusk deliberate and pure, As if the player in long ages past Knowing all grief had learned to put it by, In a calm melody where no fear is. That is our wood-thrush who each year returns To be the heart's interpreter of Spring. Minstrel of solitude and poet's lore, His is the music of unspoken things. Hark how the minor tenderness of time, Old wistful longings and the storied years, Blend in untarnished gladness, melt and sing The unembittered rapture of the hour. III O music maker of the pagan Spring, Untrammeled seraph of the wilderness! How should he know the truth at beauty's core, Or solve the strange enigma of desire? For through those wild melodious cadences The tender phrase of earthly sorrow blends With the pure theme of spirit's certitude Grown rapturous above all taking thought, In that serene victorious artistry. For all the labored questing of our art, Who finds the sorcery of Nature's way, And how her free born wisdom works its will? Before this woodland canticle we bow, Knowing perfection ... immortality! JUNE LEISURE When June revisits the New England shore, She takes the road along the Silvermine, Where noble trees in every dooryard stand And shadowy gardens full of dreamy peace Spread all the full-blown peonies to the sun. By every orchard wall the air is sweet With breath of honeysuckle, and the air Filled with the murmur of the industrious bees; The river babbles down its dark ravine By the old mill; the bobolinks spring up, Scattering music as of fairy bells From every open field; a few white clouds Wander across the unimagined blue; And all is well again with earth and heaven. FROM THE DOOR OF HEAVEN Now the tall tulip trees have lifted up Their green-gold chalices against the sun, And the white locusts from the door of Heaven Spill their honied fragrance on the air. Over the open fields the bobolinks Toss the gay music of their carillons Down to the pasture foot where bob-white calls, And through the meadow blows the purple flag. By many a wild trail in the wooded hills, And many a path along the foaming shore, With unforgotten rapture of old years And airs that lift the heart on ventures new, June is come back to her New England home To make of earth a paradise once more. WHITE IRIS I The South wind snows the apple blossoms down And scatters on the grass the petals white; The sky turns azure from its faint spring gray, And all the woods put on their summer green; Fresh is the air with ecstasy new born; And by the garden wall whose old gray stones Show purple where the netted sunlight falls, White Iris now her oriflame unfurls. Beneath that emblem who would not enroll? For this is beauty's banner blown afar To signal how it fares with Earth's deep heart, Breeding her fancies to perfection still And bringing them in loveliness to birth, According to the ordered thought triune. II This is the artist's sign that bids him dare-- The craftsman's symbol of supremacy-- The trefoil of perfection, showing forth How skill and understanding must conspire With the Lord of Love to bring heart's wish to pass In goodliness, in beauty, and in truth, That loving kindness may possess the world, And joyous wisdom prosper to the end. As when the Word first moved upon the void And swung the planets in stupendous poise, And there was light--and life--to carry on-- It moves today to form, inspire, sustain-- Man and his doings on the brink of time, And this frail flower unanxious in the sun. THE BATHER The painted tulips, like a glorious host With pennons nodding in the warm south wind, Crowd by the garden walks; in the fresh grass The dandelions are strewn like louis-d'ors; Adoring lilacs blossom by the porch; While through the orchard in its clouds of bloom The whistling orioles dart like flakes of fire, And down beyond the roadside calls a quail. In the on-coming haze of summer now That floods the earth with languor and pale fire, The mellowing woods are like a frail Corot-- Where dark stems merge with misty red and green Reflected in the gray-green of the lake, Tranced on the brink a slim young bather stands. EARLY SUMMER In early summer now the world anew Is fashioned by the south wind and the sun And that dark sorcery which no man knows. The greening woods, the orchards in full blow, The bright marsh-marigolds by pasture streams, And hollyhocks along the garden wall-- The scene is like a gorgeous tapestry Hung in some old gray castle by the sea, Along whose corridors no footfall sounds, And only fragrant winds with ghostly hands Its hallowed timeless reveries disturb. And so within the summer's pageantry Along austere New England's shadowed ways Immortal calm of loveliness abides. HARVEST Now when the time of fruit and grain is come, When apples hang above the garden wall, And from the tangle by the roadside stream A scent of wild grapes fills the racy air, Comes Autumn with her sun-burnt caravan, Like a long gypsy train with trappings gay And tattered colors of the Orient, Moving slow-footed through the dreamy hills. The woods of Wilton, at her coming, wear Tints of Bokhara and of Samarcand; The maples glow with their Pompeian red, The hickories with burnt Etruscan gold; And while the crickets fife along her march, Behind her banners burns the crimson sun. BLUEBIRD IN OCTOBER When the October woods in Orient dyes Are at their peak of splendor, and the bloom Of Indian summer lies upon the Hills, There is a hushed expectancy, as if Some medieval city on a morn, Emblazoned with pure gold and scarlet gems, Waited entranced a silver trumpet call To sound its fanfare for triumphal news. And then across the sunburnt valley comes-- No sudden cry of any victory, Nor answering tumult of the charmed scene-- Only, repeated like a litany Of the fond heart, a bluebird's plaintive note, Homesick for April, native of the Spring. THE MAGIC MAKER Where the old Danbury Turnpike branches off From the Valley Road to cross our meadow stream, There is a shallow where the river sings Slipping under the bridge where willows lean From crumbling banks. There on a spell-bound day, Through the blue hazy doorway of the hills October with her mystic pomp comes by. As children watch a painter at his work In awe until they win his slow regard, The smile of those who dream and understand, We linger on entranced by glowing earth, The splendor of the blazoned woods all still, The pattern of the everlasting hours.... The lone Designer of Indian Summer smiles. INDIAN SUMMER Lord of the sunshine and the soul of earth, Here in the slow autumnal afternoon Drenched in the balm that sweetens the blue grape And keeps the cricket chirping in the grass, Musing on loveliness there come to us Hints of supernal artistry,--we learn The folly of impatience and despair. Not the sublime sierras in their snows Guarding the secrets of the Manitou, Nor desert ranges flushed with sunrise gold, Silent in wonder, nor the fragrant moors Above the summer sea, are lovelier Than these haze-haunted Indian-summer lands In the wild Valley of the Rippowam. NOVEMBER SUNSET Up from Broad River to the Wilton hills The valley lies in late November now, Flooded with purple twilight warm as wine. Northward the woods lie far and wide outspread In their wild peace, their gray austerity Bathed in the ash of autumn's passing glow-- The mellow consolation of the year More mystical than all of summer's pride. Upon the western ridge, where the trees stand In silhouette against a cold green light, The scarlet sun goes down in amethyst, His day accomplished and the solemn hour Of his departure lit with sacred fires That flush the sky with a supernal mauve. AUTUMN CLOSING The show is over, and the leafy tent All gold and crimson where the sunlight lingered Through the slow afternoon, is coming down. The bittersweet is scarlet on the bough Reluctant to be gone, though frosts have strewn Patrins of glory on the forest trails, While tatters of torn splendor go to feed The smoky bonfires in the village street. What singer pipes the closing autumn hush With surest note of cheer in all the wild? A dauntless minstrel of the changing year, Chickadee of the wilderness! He knows What sweetness gathers in the winter's heart, What saving oracles the North Wind sings. CHRYSANTHEMUMS They do not come when gorgeous June is here, Nor with the pomp of August passing by. But when the roadside asters are all gone With the last trace of summer from the fields-- When the last cricket has long since been hushed And earth awaits in silence the first frost-- In white and mauve, dark red and antique gold, These true patricians of the garden come. When snow is in the air and low gray skies Are bleak with coming winter, like a host In medieval frescoes many-hued With banners and TE DEUMS, they return To offer brave Thanksgiving and to grace Deserted gardens with their noble praise. WILD GEESE To-night with snow in the November air, Over the roof I heard that startling cry Passing along the highway of the dark-- The Wild Geese going South. Confused commands As of a column on the march rang out Clamorous and sharp against the frosty air. And with an answering tumult in my heart I too went hurrying out into the night Was it from some deep immemorial past I learned those summoning signals and alarms, And still must answer to my brothers' call? I knew the darkling hope that bade them rise From Northern lakes, and with courageous hearts Adventure forth on their uncharted quest. THE WINTER SCENE I The rutted roads are all like iron; skies Are keen and brilliant; only the oak-leaves cling In the bare woods, or the hardy bitter-sweet; Drivers have put their sheepskin jackets on; And all the ponds are sealed with sheeted ice That rings with stroke of skate and hockey-stick, Or in the twilight cracks with running whoop. Bring in the logs of oak and hickory, And make an ample blaze on the wide hearth. Now is the time, with winter o'er the world, For books and friends and yellow candle-light, And timeless lingering by the settling fire. While all the shuddering stars are keen with cold. II Out from the silent portal of the hours, When frosts are come and all the hosts put on. Their burnished gear to march across the night And o'er a darkened earth in splendor shine, Slowly above the world Orion wheels His glittering square, while on the shadowy hill And throbbing like a sea-light through the dusk, Great Sirius rises in his flashing blue. Lord of the winter night, august and pure, Returning year on year untouched by time, To hearten faith with thine unfaltering fire, There are no hurts that beauty cannot ease, No ills that love cannot at last repair, In the victorious progress of the soul. III Russet and white and gray is the oak wood In the great snow. Still from the North it comes, Whispering, settling, sifting through the trees, O'erloading branch and twig. The road is lost. Clearing and meadow, stream and ice-bound pond Are made once more a trackless wilderness In the white hush where not a creature stirs; And the pale sun is blotted from the sky. In that strange twilight the lone traveller halts To listen to the stealthy snowflakes fall. And then far off toward the Stamford shore, Where through the storm the coastwise liners go, Faint and recurrent on the muffled air, A foghorn booming through the smother--hark! IV When the day changed and the mad wind died down, The powdery drifts that all day long had blown Across the meadows and the open fields, Or whirled like diamond dust in the bright sun, Settled to rest, and for a tranquil hour The lengthening bluish shadows on the snow Stole down the orchard slope, and a rose light Flooded the earth with beauty and with peace. Then in the west behind the cedars black The sinking sun stained red the winter dusk With sullen flare upon the snowy ridge,-- As in a masterpiece by Hokusai, Where on a background gray, with flaming breath A scarlet dragon dies in dusky gold. SANCTUARY When winter comes, along the Silvermine, And earth has put away her green attire, With all the pomp of her autumnal pride, The world is made a sanctuary old, Where Gothic trees uphold the arch of gray, And gaunt stone fences on the ridge's crest Stand like carved screens before a crimson shrine, Showing the sunset glory through the chinks. There, like a nun with frosty breath, the soul, Uplift in adoration, sees the world Transfigured as a temple of her Lord; While down the soft blue-shadowed aisles of snow Night, like a sacristan with silent step, Passes to light the tapers of the stars. STAR! Look out, dear heart, above the twilight wood! There in the blue-gray of the winter dusk, Above the dark-lined tree-tops still with cold, The evening star in limpid glory hangs,-- In everlasting beauty as it hung Above the walls of Ninevah and Tyre, And where the Lesbian oleanders flowered, The lover's star of prophesy and peace. Ah, yes, unsullied and immortal still, It shines for you and me, and will shine on When we have left this lovely country side, Forever lighting up the dream of man,-- The star of friendship and felicity, A lamp within the entry of the night. THE YULE TREE Now on the night when Christ was born, bring in The evergreen and heavenward pointing fir, By Winfrid blessed a thousand years ago To be the emblem of eternal life And fragrant hardihood through all its days. Well has it served to keep the forest cheer, To shelter the wild creatures from the snow, For sill and rafter and quick kindling fire. Ever aspiring and unbowed it grows, Saving the good committed to its care, And to its holy fruitage comes at last,-- Bearing upon its boughs the gifts of love, Immortal memories and glad surprise, Making the children's eyes to shine like stars. NEW YEAR'S EVE The air is pulsing as with crowding wings. Migrant Ideals and valiant-hearted Dreams, The Heavenly vanguard of eternity, Muster to cross the frontier of new days. A brave unhasting company, they throng Out of old years with life's immortal zest,-- In gleaming panoply of seraphim Advance these dauntless heralds of all good. 'Tis midnight hour. The clanging bells break forth. The march of man has crossed the boundary Into another year. Close up the ranks! Our ancients bid, fare on! New Year, Salute! The promise of the past is on your knees. The glory of all time is unto God. THE SUN ROOM From snow-bound paths and shortened afternoons One step to summer warmth's beatitude, The desert's balm, the Orient's opulence! A buckskin wall, a poppy-golden floor, Tables and benches bold in lacquer red, A Zuni blanket, Indian pottery, And gorgeous chintz gay with great fabulous birds,-- All glowing life. Outside as day burns low, Within his rocky hollow the gray brook Makes iridescent frost-work where it runs Through the blue snow; while o'er the purpling ridge Where black woods stand against a pale jade sky, Between two oaks a Mandarin-orange sun Hangs like a Chinese gong immense and still. BUDDHA I In Burmese alabaster white and smooth, Two thousand years ago the workman cut, And pricked with gold, fine scarlet and dull blue, This seated image of the Lord of Life. The face still wears its infinite regard; The mouth still curves with its ineffable smile; The hand lies open in the folded lap; And still the generations do not know. Here for remembrance reverently we place, With thoughts made gentler by his gentleness, The yellow daffodils in early spring; The blue flag from the meadows in high June; And the red lilies of the August moors; Praying for love, for wisdom and for peace. II Immortal brother of the tranquil soul, On the first day when winter is gone by And the soft twilight has a tender hue, In sign of love we bring the yellow flowers,-- These chalices of sunlight cooled in earth,-- As symbols of the never-wearying life Which takes new form yet keeps its fervor pure, And out of darkness into light returns. Where may the seed of love within the heart Prosper and grow and fill all time with joy, As the green blade comes up through garden mould, Breaking to bud and blossoming in the sun, Till all the world is a victorious host With golden banners floating on the breeze? III And now, in summer when the arch of sky Bends o'er us its far illimitable blue, To meet the azure of the ocean floor Upon the threshold of infinity, By many a far-run stream in alien ground, And where our garden takes the warming sun, Blows the blue meadow-flag, to carpet earth With tints of sky and shadows of the sea. As in our minds from seeds of knowledge bloom The flowers of wisdom, colored with the light Of dreams and shadowings of eager life, For Buddha in her season Iris blooms,-- A symbol of creation's loveliness In her pure color of eternal truth. A FANTASY Against the South Room wall of Sunshine House There hangs a Japanese embroidery. Upon a background of bright whorls of gold Long drooping lines of blue wistaria sway, While from the pond below white cranes upwing Trailing their slim black legs in heavy flight, Or turn with sleek necks and red eyes to peer In the pale reedy shallows where they wade. And there, when all the paths were locked in snow, On many a summer journey I have gone Through that fantastic land of golden art, Where flowers fade not, the sun never dies, And prisoned Sense may rove away from time, A happy wanderer through Heart's Desire. FIVE MILE RIVER Deep in New England's heart there is a dell Where Five Mile River sings the whole year through. In May the ivory dogwood blossoms there And the blue flag, while with the evening star Through green twilight it hears the angelic thrush. On summer eves it serenades the moon While fireflies swing their lanterns from its banks. And there the October woods outspread a maze Of rose and russet and Etruscan gold, More precious than the Vale of Avalon Or any road to storied Camelot. A-tinkle with thin ice on frosty morns Our happy river still is chiming low The woodland music of enchanted hours. CONCLUSION Heaven is no larger than Connecticut; No larger than Fairfield County; no, no larger Than the little valley of the Silvermine The white sun visits and the wandering showers. For there is room enough for spring's return, For lilac evenings and the rising moon, And time enough for autumn's idle days, When soul is ripe for immortality. And there when winter comes with smouldering dusk To kindle rosy flames upon the hearth, And hang his starry belt upon the night, One firelit room is large enough for heaven, For all we know of wisdom and of love, And the eternal welfare of the heart. [End of _Sanctuary_ by Bliss Carman]