THE FOOL'S PRAYER THE royal feast was done; the King Sought some new sport to banish care, And to his jester cried: "Sir Fool, Kneel now, and make for us a prayer! The jester doffed his cap and bells, And stood the mocking court before; They could not see the bitter smile Behind the painted grin he wore. He bowed his head, and bent his knee "No pity, Lord, could change the heart From red with wrong to white as wool; The rod must heal the sin: but, Lord, Be merciful to me, a fool! «'Tis not by guilt the onward sweep Of truth and right, O Lord, we stay; 'Tis by our follies that so long We hold the earth from heaven away. 276 THE FOOL'S PRAYER "These clumsy feet, still in the mire, Go crushing blossoms without end; "The ill-timed truth we might have kept- "Our faults no tenderness should ask, The chastening stripes must cleanse them all; "Earth bears no balsam for mistakes; Men crown the knave, and scourge the tool The room was hushed; in silence rose THIS I beheld, or dreamed it in a dream : A furious battle, and men yelled, and swords And thought, "Had I a sword of keener steel - but this Blunt thing — !" he snapt and flung it from his hand, And lowering crept away and left the field. Then came the king's son, wounded, sore bestead, And ran and snatched it, and with battle-shout And saved a great cause that heroic day. AN ASPIRATION YALE CLUB, SAN FRANCISCO, DECEMBER 11, 1879 LET us return once more, we said, And greet the saintly mother Yale; That gray and venerable head, That wrinkled brow, time-worn and pale. So from afar we fared, and found Her children thronging round her feet: The summer all her elms had crowned, The dappled grass was cool and sweet. But lo! no ancient dame was there, With tottering step and waning powers: Our maiden mother, fresh and fair, Stood queenlike 'mid her trees and towers. Men may grow old: Time's tremulous hands Still hasten the spent glass; but she "Mewing her mighty youth" she stands, And wears her laurels royally. From olden fountain-wells that flow As pure as fire, as cold as snow, Her lips have quaffed immortal youth. AN ASPIRATION Her feet in fields of amaranth tread, Are in her hand, and round her head Ah, maiden-mother, might there rise It matters little that it bear 279 The name that Cloyne's great bishop bore, If only it might bring the fair Fulfillment of his thought of yore; If somewhere, on the hill or plain, If one like Yale among us stood, The infant vigor of the West. The smitten rocks pour forth in vain Their Midas-streams: when shall be wrought From out our store some classic fane, Some cloistered home of finer thought? |