IN TOWNS AND LITTLE TOWNS

A BOOK OF POEMS

LEONARD FEENEY, S. J.

THE AMERICA PRESS

NEW YORK

1927

Cum Permissu Superiorum

To my mother from her minstrel boy

IF there be pale princesses,

And ragged royalty;

And monarchs without money,

And pompless pedigree;

And queens without courtiers,

And kings without crowns,

Lord, make me laureate

In towns and little towns.

CONTENTS

The Teacher

Achievement

A Saint for Monday Morning

Recipe for a Butterfly

The Altar Boy

Wealth

Prayer for a Crossing-Tender

The Beggar’s Ultimatum

Song of the Meadow Boy

To My Grandfather

Moonrise on Swampson Beach

IN THE EVERLASTING CITY

Father Hopkins’ Mystic Songs

THE TEACHER

I drudge and toil - but I have my hour

As I sit in my high-backed chair,

With the wide adoring eyes of youth

Upon me there.

I tell them the tale of the mighty horse

That straddled the gates of Troy,

And it puts the wonder on Timothy,

The grocer’s boy.

I tell them of fair Endymion

Who slept by the mountain stream;

And little Hubert, the tinsmith’s lad,

Begins to dream.

And the tale of the winds and the Aulian maid

Who died on the golden sands

Makes David, the baker’s son, look up

And wring his hands.

Oh there is a dream that is lightly passed

And one that will vanish not!

But what will become of the dreaming lads

That I begot?

Who’ll mend the kettles and pots and pans

Forever and ever more?

And what will become of the baker’s shop

And the grocery store?

ACHIEVEMENT

Solon, Plato, Socrates -

Where does your vaunted learning stand?

My grandfather was a schoolmaster

In Ireland!

Tall legions, Roman Caesar’s men -

And trooped ye fearless to the sea?

My father’s uncle brained a bull

With the limb of an apple-tree!

Fair handiwork of Raphael,

Delicate still while ages pass -

My grandmother knitted the silken stole

A priest wore once for holy Mass.

Temples and shrines of the dreamy East:

A tower will fall if man begin it;

The thatched cottage of my sires

Had two real windows in it!

And Orpheus, thou poor lutanist,

For all thy windy lyre played, -

My father whistled a little tune

And he won a better maid!

A SAINT FOR MONDAY MORNING

There’s a little wooden clothes-rack

That stands in our back hall,

Where a little wrinkled lady

Hangs her bonnet and her shawl

Every Monday very early,

And she tip-toes unawares

To the laundry room, in silence,

Down behind the kitchen stairs

To scrub, scrub, scrub,

In her little round tub.

Although the water spoils her dress

And moistens her white hair,

Yet the laundry gets a fairy touch

Somehow, when she is there.

For this little wrinkled lady

Is so very small to see,

And both her shrunken hands are white

As any bride’s could be.

And her cheeks grow red as apples

When the steam begins to rise

And the iridescent suds shine clear

Reflected in her eyes;

With a hundred twinkling bubbles

In the Monday morning sun

And a multicolored rainbow

On the rim of every one.

And the pretty things she handles:

Muslins, linens, lace and things;

And on her fingers soap crystals

Make little diamond rings.

And when the steam begins to sing

She starts a-humming, too;

And they make a curious harmony,

The steam and humming do,

With the scrub, scrub, scrub,

Of her little round tub.

And when she pours the blueing in

And starts again to scrub

You’d think it was a tiny sea,

This little wooden tub.

And when the sparkling, soapy waves

Keep splashing o’er and o’er,

You might fancy her a little girl

Playing on the shore.

Ah, but little seashore maidens

Do not have such snowy hair,

And none of them have foreheads dimmed

Nor shoulders drooped with care,

Nor wrinkles that the long slow years

Have grooved in painfully;

For a hard and weary life it is

To be a wash-lady.

But there’ll come a Monday morning

When the little tub will rest,

And they’ll fold two very tired hands

Upon a tired breast.

And the angels will be telling her

In God’s eternity,

How He loved the music that she made,

The dull monotony

Of the scrub, scrub, scrub,

In her little round tub.

LOVE’S YOUNG DREAM

Did you recall, Methuselah,

When you were white and old

A maid, a moonlit night and a

Sweet vow you told?

Methuselah, did you recall

The song your heart had sung,

When she was fair, and love was all,

And you were young?

And count each lonely century,

And live the days again

When you were a hundred and twenty, and she

A hundred and ten!

TO A BLACKSMITH

Had I the brawn, not linened and laundered

In fashion, these idle times,

Would I bide the hours - my strength all squandered

On rhymes.

With the loan of your hammer to smite with a dreadful

Swing on the molten bars,

I would people the dingy air with a shedful

Of stars!

NIGHT NOISES

Angela died today and went to Heaven;

We counted her summers up and they were seven.

But why does that trouble you, unloosened shutter,

That flap at my window in the wind’s wild flutter!

Angela’s eyes tonight are cold and dim,

Off in the land of song and Seraphim.

But what does that mean to you, O creaking stair,

And mice in the wall that gnaw the plaster there!

Angela’s little hands are folded white,

Deep in the meadow, under the starry night.

But why should an ugly gnat keep finely whining

Around the candle-flame beside me shining!

And never again - and never again will she

Come running across the field to welcome me.

But, little sheep-bells, out on the distant hill,

Why, at this hour, do you wake and tinkle still!

And not any more - alas! - and not any more,

Will she climb the stairs and knock at my lonely door.

But, moaning owl in the hayloft overhead,

How did you come to know that she was dead!

VANITY

She sat one morn by a looking-glass

Watching her youth and her beauty pass;

And she spied on her cheek a pallor repose

And she powdered it o’er with a radiant rose.

She sat one noon by a mirror pool

Watching the light in her eyes grow cool;

And she spied on her forehead a silver hair

And she tucked it away in complete despair.

She sat one eve by a starlit well

Watching the charm that the years dispel;

And she spied a wee wrinkle run over her face

And she rubbed it out quickly in utter disgrace.

She slept one night in a narrow grave

Watching the poppies and lilies wave;

And a dandelion over her head she spied

And she smothered its roots till it withered and died!

LUNACY

Sweeter than moons or accurate planets swing

In rhythmic, pale, parabolas of light,

I count a lone star in its wandering

Along the trackless orbit of the night.

And sometimes wise men chattering away

Things true, coherent and proper - I hold less

Than a poor little mind bewildered and astray

From love or grief or utter loneliness.

A FORGOTTEN BIRTHDAY

(For Eileen)

Oh, the seventeenth of August,

How could I forget, my dear!

Not an angel up in Heaven

But remembered it, I fear.

Not a single white-winged angel

But was very much aware

Of your birthday - by the music,

By the fragrance in the air.

Yet the seventeenth of August,

It completely passed me by:

I never even noticed it

Nor stopped to wonder why.

And yet I had a reason

For forgetting, don’t you see,

For the seventeenth of August

Has been pretty mean to me.

For it prowls around each summer

With its sly, secretive smile,

And bit by bit it’s plundering

A little girl, the while.

And bit by bit it’s trying hard

To make her old and wise

And shut the world of fairyland

Forever from her eyes.

I am going to take the calendar

That hangs upon the wall

And cut the seventeenth of August

Out - for once and all.

Oh! The seventeenth of August! -

I despise and hate it so;

I wish I had forgotten it

A dozen years ago.

And maybe you would still be seven

Or maybe you’d be eight,

And every night I’d come and find you

Swinging on the gate.

THE GERANIUM

If you wish to grow a lily

With its white and golden hue

You will have to have a mansion

And a gardener or two.

If you fondle a chrysanthemum

From Spring to early Fall,

It may consent to bloom a bit,

If it ever blooms at all.

A rose must have a radiant bush

With lots of room and air;

And a peony wants the terrace

Of a multimillionaire;

But all a poor geranium

Will ever ask a man -

Is a little bit of fragrant earth

And an old tomato can.

RECIPE FOR A BUTTERFLY

Cut two radiant strips of rainbow veil

From heaven high;

Dip them first in a rose’s, then in a violet’s blood,

The while they lie;

Scatter them o’er with the powder caught from a moony mist

And let them dry.

Reach up above and pull two little, gold starry eyes

Out of the sky.

The whole throw gently into the breath of a garden wind, -

And it will fly!!

THE ALTAR BOY

His cheeks grow red from the candle heat

As the carpet under his noiseless feet.

And no two stars could be half so bright

As his deep brown eyes in the candle-light.

An angel he seems with his surplice wings,

Who knows when God is to come, - and rings.

And the clouds from the censer swinging there

A fragrance leave in his golden hair.

It fills us all with a wondrous dread,

His nearness unto the Holy Bread.

Now I wonder what path in life he’ll plan:

A doctor - a lawyer - a merchantman?

God keep him always there, we pray,

Treading the altar’s plush highway.

WEALTH

You can buy a rubber ball

For a penny.

Oh the wonder of it all

For a penny!

Or a whistle or a gun

Or a sugar-coated bun -

You can have a lot of fun

For a penny.

You can wear a jewelled pin

For a penny;

And you’re fifty dollars in

For a penny.

You can find how much you weigh,

Read the gossip of the day,

And a music-box will play

For a penny.

You can drive away the night

For a penny,

With a stick of candle-light

For a penny.

When the circus comes in June

You can buy a toy balloon;

Send it floating to the moon -

For a penny.

All the pleasure, who can guess

For a penny!

Who can count the happiness

For a penny!

Why this striving after gold?

Life is yours to have and hold;

You can have your fortune told -

For a penny!

PRAYER OF A CROSSING-TENDER

God help a poor old man to guard

The traffic of the town.

May God give strength to my right arm

To swing the white gates down.

God make my eyes alert to see

From break o’ dawn till night,

And watch the steps of little tots

Who are my heart’s delight.

But oh, when Mistress Guzzlegold

Comes knocking at my shack

Enquiring if her fluffy dog

May safely cross the track:

May God forgive the likes of me

For ever taking pains

In trying to keep the likes of her

From being hit by trains.

THE TRAFFIC COP

(From a Servant-Girl)

He said to me, “Fair Maiden,

And what is it you do?”

I said, “I’m a living-out girl

On Fifth Avenue.”

He said, “I’ve rarely seen a maid

With so much sweetness in her.”

I said, “I’d like to cross the road

And hurry home for dinner!”

He looked at me and raised his hand: -

Ah Lord and who am I

That millionaires in motor-cars

Should stop to let me by?

One gesture from his noble hand,

One swift look at the throng

And the roadway clears like magic

And the people move along.

I dreamt of him, and in my dreams

He stood in worlds afar;

He kept the planets in their course

And star from striking star!

And little hoped a timid maid

As plain as I to win him;

He’s so beautiful and mighty -

There is some archangel in him.

But one night when Fifth Avenue

And all its roar was still,

I heard his shiny whistle blow

Beneath my window-sill.

I ran from the lonely kitchen

And let the curtain drop -

And put my hand into the hand

That makes the whole world STOP.

A song of love he sang to me;

His words were sweet and low;

I did not dare resist the voice

That makes the whole world GO.

I ran away to be his bride,

My heart was all a-quiver -

Now I’m climbing seven flights of stairs

Beside the Harlem River.

If you see a big policeman,

You people passing by,

With a wistful look upon him -

You will know the reason why.

He is tired of the cross-streets

And lonely in the noise;

And he’s longing for the traffic

Of his little girls and boys.

THE FAMILY OVERHEAD

They blew on bugles, beat on drums,

And slammed each separate door.

They walked a hundred elephants

Across the kitchen floor.

They talked the talk of Babylon

And fought the fights of Troy;

They slaughtered sleep, they clubbed repose

And murdered peace and joy.

They nearly made me lunatic,

And well I blessed the day

Three burly moving-men drove up

And carted them away . . .

The family overhead is gone

But I sit and wonder still

About the little yellow bird

That used to cheep and trill.

And I wonder about the lullaby

A woman used to sing,

That sounded, quiet afternoons,

As sweet as anything.

And I wonder about the tiny feet

That pattered on the stairs;

And the lilt and drawl at candle-time

Of somebody’s “good-night prayers.”

And I wonder why is it the din of life

Will so engross a man,

He’ll let its music and melody

Slip off in a moving-van.

A PAIR OF SPECTACLES

Her eyes are strained from sewing and from mending,

My mother sees a mist upon the sea.

My mother sees a haze upon the meadow,

And a filmy web on each uncertain tree.

Her eyes are tired from watching and from weeping,

My mother sees a cloud across the sun;

And very dimly she beholds the starlight

At evening, when the dreary day is done.

And last night as I stood there in her doorway, -

I flickered, and my shroud she seemed to see.

And now she wears her little gold-rimmed spectacles

Whenever she looks at me!

THE DEATHBED

Lord, was there need of a bitter thorn

To pierce her heart,

She who is withered and weak and worn

And broken apart!

Why is the night so dark and no sky

To brighten her,

When You know that it takes but a little cry

To frighten her!

When the smallest straw would have bent her low

So frail and cold,

Why must You now a mountain throw

On one so old!

See how the rivulet wrinkles run,

And will You place

Another and yet another one

On her tired face!

“Hush!” cried the woman “the hour of three

Is nigh for me!

He is up on the arms of a splintered tree

In the sky for me!

I am helping His mother to stand till

He Will die for me!”

THE ASHCART

In search of beauty, truth and art,

For which I hold my pen in trust,

I wonder would I dare to sing

About a wagon-load of dust!

About a human fireside,

Its love and laughter sifted down

And smothered up in chimney smoke,

And slowly carted out of town!

I wonder is this rumbling pile,

This ugly little charnel heap,

Too lowly for the charm of verse -

Too unromantically cheap!

And should a poet tell a man

Who drives an ashcart in the square

He may not dream of fairyland,

Of what is beautiful and fair?

And must the wonder of his soul

Be stifled in this withered pyre,

Because his body is not clean,

Because his clothes are burnt with fire?

Then would a poet rob a man

Of every hope and high surprise,

And brush the sunshine from his face

And throw more ashes in his eyes.

Since when are we immaculate,

Who make a verse and turn a rhyme,

That we should hurl our scorn at him

Who wheels away the Summertime;

Who chariots autumn leaves to rest,

The flowers of June, the buds of May;

Who fumbles in the ruined wreck

Of trinkets we have thrown away;

Old China cups and parasols,

And tattered books that once were new; -

A faded gown, and old man’s hat,

A little baby’s broken shoe; -

A picture of your mother’s youth;

The way she used to hold her head;

The crumpled wreaths that heroes wore,

The charred love-letters of the dead!

The whistle of the lark is heard

Across the Monday morning sky: -

His children hold the ashman’s hand,

A woman kisses him good-bye.

And with their image in his heart

He takes his last look at the light

And leaps upon his wagon seat

And drives into his smoky night.

He fights for bread, he fights for breath,

His hands are wrinkled up with pain.

He fights the meanest foes of life:

Ingratitude and man’s disdain.

He feeds upon the furnace blast,

The tear-drops on his eyelids burn.

He hears the trumpet call of time:

“And unto dust thou shalt return.”

Lift up your head - po