The Demeter Of Praxiteles.

Demeter? 'Tis a name! For in thy face
A myriad women find their mourning-place!
Thou, sitting lonely on the wayside stone,
O pagan mother, thou art not alone!

Though Hellas now, thy grief so calmly worn!
Yet art thou Egypt, reft of thy first-born;
And now lamenting Rama, that fair head
With ashes strewn, and all uncomforted!

And Mary thou, and many women more!
This very day I see thee at my door;
Thine was the voice, an hour ago, that cried
From the next house, wherein a child has died!

Margaret Steele Anderson

Margaret Steele Anderson was an American poet and author, born on October 8, 1867. She is known for her lyrical and expressive poetry, which often explores themes of nature, emotion, and personal reflection. Anderson's works include several published collections of poetry and prose that garnered critical acclaim during her lifetime. Though not as widely recognized today, her contributions to American literature remain significant. She passed away on October 7, 1921.

Margaret Steele Anderson

The Dead Child.

Margaret Steele Anderson, Simple Poetry

The Shepherd.

Margaret Steele Anderson, Simple Poetry

Courage.

Margaret Steele Anderson, Simple Poetry

The Dream.

Margaret Steele Anderson, Simple Poetry

English

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Demeter.

Demeter sad! the wells of sorrow lay
Eternal gushing in thy lonely path.

Methinks I see her now - an awful shape
Tall o'er a dragon team in frenzied search
From Argive plains unto the jeweled shores
Of the remotest Ind, where Usha's hand
Tinged her grief-cloven brow with kindly touch,
And Savitar wheeled genial thro' the skies
O'er palmy regions of the faneless Brahm.

In melancholy search I see her roam
O'er the steep peaks of Himalayas keen
With the unmellowed frosts of Boreal storms,
Then back again with that wild mother woe
Writ in the anguished fire of her eyes, -
Back where old Atlas groans 'neath weight of worlds,
And the Cimmerian twilight glooms the soul.
Deep was her sleep in Persia's haunted vales,
Where many a languid Philomela moan...

Madison Julius Cawein

Persephone.

(Written for THE PORTFOLIO SOCIETY, January, 1862.

Subject given - "Light and Shade.")


She stepped upon Sicilian grass,
Demeter's daughter fresh and fair,
A child of light, a radiant lass,
And gamesome as the morning air.
The daffodils were fair to see,
They nodded lightly on the lea,
Persephone - Persephone!

Lo! one she marked of rarer growth
Than orchis or anemone;
For it the maiden left them both,
And parted from her company.
Drawn nigh she deemed it fairer still,
And stooped to gather by the rill
The daffodil, the daffodil.

What ailed the meadow that it shook?
What ailed the air of Sicily?
She wondered by the brattling brook,
And trembled with the trembling lea.
"The coal-black horses rise - they rise:

Jean Ingelow

On A Pompeiian Bust Called "Sappho."

Oh no, not this! This is a Roman face,
Superb, composed, with such a matron grace
As that of great Cornelia, never thee.
Young princess of an ancient poetry!

Nor do I wish thy beauty from its grave;
Rather, one bird across the purple wave,
Or the mere sight of that Aegean sea.
Shall tell thy mortal loveliness to me!

Or I will find some slender, broken plinth.
And mark it thine with wild blue hyacinth,
While some far fruit, upon triumphant bough.
Shall say how unattainable wert thou!

Margaret Steele Anderson

The Argive Women[2]

CHTHONOË    MYRTILLA
RHODOPE    PASIPHASSA
GORGO    SITYS

**    *    *    *

SCENE

The women's house in the House of Paris in Troy.

TIME.--The Tenth year of the War.

**    *    *    *

Helen's women are lying alone in the twilight hour. Chthonoë presently rises and throws a little incense upon the altar flame. Then she begins to speak to the Image of Aphrodite in a low and tired voice.


    CHTHONOË

Goddess of burning and little rest,
By the hand swaying on thy breast,
By glancing eye and slow sweet smile
Tell me what long look or what guile
Of thine it was that like a spear
Pierced her heart, who caged me here
In this close house, to be with her
Mistress at once and prisoner!
Far from earth a...

Maurice Henry Hewlett

Lines Written To A Translator Of Greek Poetry.

A wild spring upland all this charmed page,
Where, in the early dawn, the maenads rage,
Mad, chaste, and lovely! This, a darker spot
Where lone Antigone bewails her lot.
Death for her spouse, her bridal-bed the tomb.
And this, again, is some rich palace-room.
Where Phsedra pines: "0 woodlands! 0, the sea!"
Or some sweet walk of Sappho, beauteously
Built o'er with rose, with bloom of purple grapes!
They are all here, the ancient Attic shapes
Of passion, beauty, terror, love, and shame;
Proud shadows, you do summon them by name:
Achaean princes, Helen, the young god.
Fair Dionysus, CEdipus, who trod
Such ways of doom! Aye, these and more than these
You call across the ages and the seas!
And each one, answering, doth dream he lists
To the great voices of old...

Margaret Steele Anderson

Canticle Of The Babe

I

Over the broken world, the dark gone by,
Horror of outcast darkness torn with wars;
And timeless agony
Of the white fire, heaped high by blinded Stars,
Unfaltering, unaghast;--
Out of the midmost Fire
At last,--at last,--
Cry! ...
O darkness' one desire,--
O darkness, have you heard?--
Black Chaos, blindly striving towards the Word?
--The Cry!

Behold thy conqueror, Death!
Behold, behold from whom
It flutters forth, that triumph of First-Breath,
Victorious one that can but breathe and cling,--
This pulsing flower,--this weaker than a wing,
Halcyon thing!--
Cradled above unfathomable doom.


II

Under my feet, O Death,
Under my trembling feet!
Back, through the gates of hell, now give me way.
I...

Josephine Preston Peabody