And are in And dread it is Devil's Work! A catch and a carol to the great, grand Chan, Those mad, antic Merchants! striped beasts did beat The market-square suddenly with hooves of beaten gold! The ground yawned gaping and flamed beneath our feet! They plunged to Pits Abysmal with their wealth untold! And some say For sharing of his secrets with silly, common folk: But Holy, Blessed Mary, preserve us as you may Lest once more those mad Merchants come chanting from Cathay! JESSE JAMES1 (A Design in Red and Yellow for a Nickel Library) Jesse James was a two-gun man, Strong-arm chief of an outlaw clan. He twirled an old Colt forty-five; They never took Jesse James alive. Jesse James was King of the Wes'; He'd a di'mon' heart in his lef' breas'; (Brown Missouri rolls!) 1 From Man Possessed by William Rose Benét. Copyright, 1927, by George H. Doran Company. He'd a fire in his heart no hurt could stifle; (Thunder, Missouri!) Lion eyes an' a Winchester rifle. (Missouri, roll down!) Jesse James rode a pinto hawse; Jesse rode through a sleepin' town; Hawse an' afoot they're after Jess! (Roll on, Missouri!) Spurrin' an' spurrin' - but he's gone Wes'. (Brown Missouri rolls!) He was ten foot tall when he stood in his boots; (Lightnin' like the Missouri!) More'n a match fer sich galoots. (Roll, Missouri, roll!) Jesse James rode outa the sage; Roun' the rocks come the swayin' stage; Straddlin' the road a giant stan's An' a great voice bellers, " Throw up yer han's! " Jesse raked in the di'mon' rings, The big gold watches an' the yuther things; Jesse divvied 'em then an' thar With a cryin' child had lost her mar. They're creepin'; they're crawlin', they're stalkin' Jess; (Roll on, Missouri!) They's a rumor he's gone much further Wes'; (Roll, Missouri, roll!) They's word of a cayuse hitched to the bars (Ruddy clouds on Missouri!) Of a golden sunset that busts into stars. (Missouri, roll down!) Jesse James rode hell fer leather; He was a hawse an' à man together; Jesse's heart was as sof' as a woman; They sought him here an' they sought him there, (Roll on, Missouri!) But he strides by night through the ways of the air; (Brown Missouri rolls!) They say he was took an' they say he is dead, (Thunder, Missouri!) But he ain't—he's a sunset overhead! (Missouri down to the sea!) Jesse James was a Hercules. When he went through the woods he tore up the trees. When he went on the plains he smoked the groun' Jesse James wore a red bandanner That waved on the breeze like the Star Spangled Banner; In seven states he cut up dadoes. He's gone with the buffler an' the desperadoes. Yes, Jesse James was a two-gun man (Roll on, Missouri!) The same as when this song began; (From Kansas to Illinois!) An' when you see a sunset bust into flames Or a thunderstorm blaze - that's Jesse James! ELINOR WYLIE Elinor (Hoyt) Wylie was born in Somerville, New Jersey, but she is, she protests, completely a Pennsylvanian by inheritance. On both sides she can trace her ancestry back through old American families. A grandfather was Governor of Pennsylvania, her father was solicitorgeneral in Roosevelt's administration. Her girlhood was passed in Washington, D. C. After several years abroad, she returned to America, moved to New York and married William Rose Benét in 1924. Nets to Catch the Wind (1921) is one of the most brilliant first volumes published in recent years. This brilliance is one which, at first, seems to sparkle without burning. In several of the poems the author achieves a frigid ecstasy; emotion is never absent from her lines, but too frequently it seems a passion frozen at its source. It is the brilliance of moonlight flashing on a plain of ice. But if Mrs. Wylie seldom allows her verses to become heated, she never permits them to remain dull. As a technician, she is always admirable; as in "The Eagle and the Mole," she can lift didacticism to a breathless level. Black Armour (1923) exhibits Mrs. Wylie's dramatic keenness against a mellower background. The beauty evoked in this volume no longer has "the hard heart of a child." As the intellect has grown more fiery, the mood has grown warmer while the craftsmanship is more dazzling than ever. This devotee of severe elegance has perfected an accent which is both brusque and patrician; she varies the perfect modulation with rhymes that are delightfully acrid and unexpected. Her prose is scarcely less distinguished. Jennifer Lorn (1923), which Mrs. Wylie has subtitled "A Sedate Extravaganza," The Venetian Glass Nephew (1925) and The Orphan Angel (1926), in which Mrs. Wylie pays a fantastic tribute to Shelley, juggle a harlequin style adroitly. Hers is a deft artifice and an iridescent language that could only spring from an unusually "jewelled brain." THE EAGLE AND THE MOLE Avoid the reeking herd, The huddled warmth of crowds He keeps, above the clouds, When flocks are folded warm, If in the eagle's track If you would keep your soul And there hold intercourse With roots of trees and stones, With rivers at their source, And disembodied bones. SEA LULLABY The old moon is tarnished With smoke of the flood, |