 Only a simple rhyme of poems of passion—only a simple rhyme of love and sorrow, where bliss is rhymed with kisses, heart with dart. Yet reading it, new strength I seemed to borrow, to live on bravely and to do my part. A little rhyme about a heart that's bleeding, of lonely ills and sorrow's unreleaf. I smiled at first, but there came with the reading a sense of sweet companionship in grief. The selfishness of my own woe forsaking, I thought about the singer of that song. Some other breast felt this same weary aching, another found the summer days too long. The few sad lines my sorrow so expressing, I read, and on the singer all unknown, I breathed a fervent, though a silent blessing, and seemed to clasp his hand within my own. And though fame pass him and he never know it, and though he never sings another strain, he has performed the mission of the poet, in helping some sad heart to bear its pain. And of only a simple rhyme, I will be worthy of it, of poems of passion. I may not reach the heights I seek, my untried strength may fail me, or half way up the mountain peak fierce tempests may assail me, but though that place I never gain, herein lies comfort for my pain, I will be worthy of it. I may not triumph in success, despite my earnest labour. I may not grasp results that bless the efforts of my neighbour. But though my goal I never see, this thought shall always dwell with me. I will be worthy of it. The golden glory of love's light may never fall on my way. My path may always lead through night, like some deserted byway. But though life's dearest joy I miss, there lies a nameless strength in this. I will be worthy of it. End of I will be worthy of it. Me thinks of times my heart is like some bee, that goes forth through the summer day and sings, and gathers honey from all growing things, in garden-plot or on the clover-lea. When the long afternoon grows late, and she would seek her hive, she cannot lift her wings, so heavily the two sweet bindend clings, from which she would not and yet would fly free. So with my full fond heart, for when it tries to lift itself to peace crowned heights above, the common way where countless feet have trod, lo then this burden of dear human ties, this growing weight of precious earthly love, binds down the spirit that would soar to God. End of SONNET Regret of Poems of Passion. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Jory Chan. Poems of Passion by Ella Wheeler Wilcox. Regret. There is a haunting phantom called Regret, a shadowy creature robed somewhat like woe, but fair in the face, whom all men know by her sad mean, and eyes forever wet. No heart would seek her, but once having met, all take her by the hand, and to and fro they wander through those paths of long ago, those hallowed ways to her wiser to forget. One day she led me to that lost landscape, and bade me enter, but I answered, No. I will pass on with my bold comrade fate. I have no tears to waste on thee, no time. My strength I hold for heights I hope to climb. No friend art thou for souls that would be great. End of regret. Let me lean hard upon the eternal breast, in all earth's devious ways I sought for rest and found it not. I will be strong, said I, and lean upon myself. I will not cry, and importune all heaven with my complaint. But now my strength fails, and I fall, I faint. Let me lean hard. Let me lean hard upon the unfailing arm. I said I will walk on, I fear no harm. The spark divine within my soul will show, the upward pathway where my feet should go. But now the heights to which I most aspire are lost in clouds. I stumble and I tire. Let me lean hard. Let me lean harder yet, that swerveless force which speeds the solar systems on their course can take unfelt the burden of my woe, which bears me to the dust and hurts me so. I thought my strength enough for any fate, but lo I sink beneath my sorrow's weight. Let me lean hard. End of let me lean hard. Penalty of poems of passion. Because of the fullness of what I had, all that I have seems void and vain. If I had not been happy I were not sad, though my salt is saveless, my complaint. From the ripe perfection of what was mine, all that is mine seems worse than nought. Yet I know as I sit in the darkened pine, no cup could be drained which had not been fraught. From the throb and thrill of a day that was, the day that now is seems dull with gloom. Yet I bear its dullness and darkness because it is but the reaction of glow and bloom. From the royal feast which of old was spread, I am starved on the diet which now is mine. Yet I could not turn hungry from water and bread, if I had not been sated on fruit and wine. End of Penalty of poems of passion. I saw the day lean all the world's sharp edge, and peer into night's chasm dark and damp. High in his hand he held a blazing lamp, then dropped it and plunged headlong down the ledge. With lurid splendour that swift paled to grey, I saw the dim skies suddenly flush bright. It was but the expiring glory of the light, flung from the hand of the adventurous day. The Wheel of the Breast of Poems of Passion. Through rivers of veins on the nameless quest, the tide of my life goes hurriedly sweeping, till it reaches that curious wheel of the breast, the human heart which is never at rest. So faster it cries and leaping, plunging, dashing, speeding away, the wheel and the river work night and day. I know not wherefore, I know not whither, this strange tide rushes with such mad force. It glides on hither, it slides on thither, over and over the self-same course, with never an outlet and never a source, and it lashes itself to the heat of passion, and whirls the heart in a millwheel fashion. I can hear in the hush of the still, still night the ceaseless sound of that mighty river. I can hear it gushing, gurgling, rushing, with a wild, delirious, strange delight, and a conscious pride in its sense of might, as it hurries and worries my heart for ever. I wonder oft as I lie awake, a list to the river that seethes and surges, over the wheel that it chides and urges. I wonder oft if that wheel will break, with the mighty pressure it bears, some day, or slowly and virily way away. For little by little the heart is wearing, like the wheel of the mill, as the tide goes tearing, and plunging hurriedly through my breast, in a network of veins on a nameless quest, from and forth unto unknown oceans, bringing its cargoes of fierce emotions, with never a pause or an hour for rest. End of THE WHEEL OF THE BREAST A MEETING OF PERMS OF PASSION Quite carelessly I turned the newsy sheet, a song I sang full many a year ago, smiled up at me, as in a busy street one meets an old-time friend he used to know. So full it was that simple little song, of all the hope, the transport and the truth, which to the impetuous mourn of life belong, that once again I seemed to grasp my youth. So full it was of that sweet, fancied pain, we woo and cherish ere we meet with woe. I felt as one who hears a plaintive strain his mother sang him in the long ago. Up from the grave the years that lay between that song's birthday and my stern present came, like phantom forms, and swept across the scene, bearing their broken dreams of love and fame. Fair hopes and bright ambitions that I knew, in that old time with their ideal grace, shone for a moment, then were lost to view, behind the dull clouds of the common place. With trembling hands I put the sheet away, ah, little song, the sad and bitter truth, struck like an arrow when we met that day. My life has missed the promise of its youth. The hurry of the times affects us so, in this swift rushing hour, we crowd and press and thrust each other backward as we go, and do not pause to lay sufficient stress upon that good, strong, true word, earnestness. And now in petuous haste could we but know its full deep meaning, its vast import, oh, then might we grasp the secret of success. In that receding age when men were great, the bone and sinew of their purposed lay in this one word, God likes an earnest soul, too earnest to be eager, soon or late it leaves the spent horde breathless by the way, and stands serene, triumphant at the goal. End of earnestness A picture of poems of passion, I strolled last eve across the lonely down, one solitary picture struck my eye, a distant plowboy stood against the sky, how far he seemed above the noisy town, upon the bosom of a cloud the sod laid its bruised cheek as he moved slowly by, and watching him I asked myself if I in very truth stood half as near to God. End of a picture TWIN-BORN OF PERMS OF PASSION He who possesses virtue at its best, or greatness in the true sense of the word, has one day started even with that herd, whose swift feet now speed but at sins behest. It is the same force in the human breast which makes men gods or demons. If we gird those strong emotions by which we are stirred, with might of will and purpose, heights unguessed shall dawn for us, or if we give them sway, we can sink down and consort with the lost. All virtue is worth just the price it cost. Black sin is of white truth that missed its way, and wandered off in paths not understood. TWIN-BORN I hold great evil and great good. END OF TWIN-BORN FLUDS OF PERMS OF PASSION In the dark night from sweet refreshing sleep I wake to hear outside my window-pane the uncurbed fury of the wild spring rain, and weird winds lashing the defiant deep, and raw floods that gather strength and leap down dizzy, rex-droom channels to the main. I turn upon my pillow and again compose myself for slumber. Let them sweep. I once survived great floods and do not fear, though ominous planets congregate and seem to foretell strange disasters. From a dream, ah, dear God, such a dream! I woke to hear, through the dense shadows lit by no stars gleam, the rush of mighty waters on my ear, helpless, afraid, and all alone I lay. The floods had come upon me unaware. I heard the crash of structures that were fair. The bridges of fond hopes were swept away by great salt waves of sorrow. In dismay I saw by the red lightning's lurid glare, that on the rock-bound island of despair I had been cast, till the dim dawn of day I heard my castles falling, and the roll of angry billows bearing to the sea the broken timbers of my very soul. Were all the pent-up waters from the whole stupendous solar system to break free, there are no floods that now can frighten me. A fable of perms of passion. Some coring crows are hooting owl, a hawk, a canary, an old marsh fowl, one day all meet together to hold a caucus and settle the fate of a certain bird without a mate, a bird of another feather. My friends said the owl with a look most wise. The eagle is soaring too near the skies in a way that is quite improper. Yet the world is praising her, so I am told, and I think her actions have grown so bold that some of us ought to stop her. I have heard it said, quoth hawk with a sigh, that young lambs died at the glance of her eye, and I wholly scorn and despise her. This and more I am told, they say, and I think that the only proper way is never to recognize her. I am quite convinced, said Crowe, with a call, that the eagle minds no moral law. She's a most unruly creature. She's an ugly thing, piked canary bird. Some call her handsome, it's so absurd, she hasn't a decent feature. When the old Marshen went hopping about, she said she was sure, she hadn't a doubt, of the truth of each bird's story. She thought it a duty to stop her flight, to pull her down from her lofty height, and take the guilt from her glory. But lo, from a peak on the mountain grand, that looks out over the smiling land, and over the mighty ocean, the eagle is spreading her splendid wings, she rises, rises, upward swings, with a slow majestic motion. Up in the blue of God's own skies, with a cry of rapture, away she flies, close to the great Eternal. She sweeps the world with her piercing sight, her soul is filled with the infinite, and the joy of things supernal. Thus rise forever the chosen of God, the genius crowned on the power-shod, over the dust world sailing, and back, like splinters blown by the winds, must fall the missiles of silly minds, useless and unavailing. End of a fable. End of poems of passion.