Clay SS Ile. BEHIND THE ARRAS ER anale Ni eee Sie Riles S: A Book of the Unseen pe puey ae): ao i bp s Carman BE, BK Payswww. forgotienbooks. org ISBN 9781440093890Rorgotten Books This is a Forgotten Books Library high-quality e-book from www.forgottenbooks.org Thank you for supporting Forgotten Books by purchasing this e-book. This e-book may not be distributed. If you wish to share this e-book with friends or other people, please give them the free low-quality version from www.forgottenbooks.org This book is also available in print as high-quality paperback from www.amazon.comVERTICAL LINES The vertical black lines appearing on most pages are deliberate. This is required to stop people from selling printed copies of our e-books. Our own printed books do not have these watermarks. TERMS & CONDITIONS This e-book may not be distributed. This e-book may not be modified in any way. This e-book may be printed for personal use only. No pages may be extracted or removed from this e-book. This e-book may not be included in any commercial package. This e-book may not be sold. Copyright © 2010 Forgotten Books AG(Cs Brooks FREE BOOKS www.forgottenbooks.org You can read literally thousands of books for free at www.forgottenbooks.org (please support us by visiting our web site) © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgForgotten Books takes the uppermo: the entire content of the original bo it care to preserve ik. However, this book has been generated from a scan of the original, and as such we cannot guarantee t errors or contains the full content| But we try our best} “Pow yay sc, het emt bs Resuty beng, fur nese ‘raed ect de Ca ths ure et hose opr Row shave decal Bieri preney. at it is free from lof the original. © 2010 Forgotten Books www. forgottenbooks. orgBehind the Arras © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgBehind the Arras A Book of the Unseen By Bliss Carman With Designs by T. B. Meteyard Boston and New York Lamson, Wolffe, and Company M-DCCC-KC-Y © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgCopyright, 1895, By Lamson, Wolffe, & Co. All rights reserved. © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgContents Behind the Arras Fancy’s Fool The Moondia) The Face in the Stream The Cruise of the Galleor A Song before Sailing In the Wings The Red Wolf The Faithless Lover The Crimson House The Lodger Beyond the Gamut The Juggler Hack and Hew The Night Express The Dustman The Sleepers At the Granite Gate Exit Anima © 2010 Forgotten Books Page 1 16 19 23 29 32 35 37 44 46 49 66 Br 87 gr 94 roo www. forgottenbooks. org© 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgTq G. H. B. I shut myselfin with my soul, And the shapes come eddying forth. © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. org© 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgBehind the Arras LIKE the old house tolerably well, Where I must dwell Like a familiar gnome; And yet I never shall feet quite at home: I love to roam, Day after day I loiter and explore From door to door; So many treasures lure The curious mind. What histories obscure They must immure ! T hardly know which rgom I care for best, This fronting west, With the strange hills iin view, Where the great sun |goes,--- where I may go too, When my lease is through, — Or this one for the momning and the east, Where a man may feast His cyes on looming sdils, And be the first to catgh their forcign hails Or spy their bales. © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgThen the pale summer twilights towalrds the pole! It thrills my soul With wonder and delight, When gold-green shadows walk the world at night, So still, so bright. There at the window many a time of|year, Strange faces peer, Solemn though not unkind, Their wits in search of something left) behind Time out of mind; As if they once had lived here, and stole back To the window crack For a pecp which seems to say, “Good fortune, brother, in your holusc of clay!" And then, ‘Good day!" L hear their footsteps on the gravel walk. Their scraps of talk, Aod hurrying after, reach Only the crazy sca-drone of the beach In endicss speech. © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgAnd often when the autumn noons are still, By swale and hill I see their gipsy signs, Trespassing somewhere on my border lines; With what designs? I forth afoot; but when I reach the piace, Hardly trace, Save the soft purple haze Of smouldering camp-fires, any hint betrays Who went these ways. Or tatters of pale aster blue, descried By the Orthes oadside, amp maples, here and there a shred Reveal seammp they fled, Of Indi Engross| In red, les me, But esse of all, the marvellous tapestry W here Fancies strife, uch strange things are rife, of beasts and flowers, and love and Woven to the life; Degrade id shapes and splendid scraph forms, And teeming swarms © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgOf creatures ganzy dim That cloud the dusk, and painted fish that swim, At the weaver’s whim; And wonderful birds that wheel and hang in the air, And beings with hair, And moving cycs in the face, And white bone teeth and hideous grins, who race From place to place; They build great temples to the And fume and plod To deck themselves with gold, r John-a-nod, And paint themselves like chattels to be sold, Then turn to mould. Sometimes they sccm almost as real as I; I hear them sigh; 1 sec them bow with grief, Or dance for joy like an aspen leaf, But that is brief, They have mad wars and p riages ; Behind fantom mar- © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgNor seem to guess There arc dimensions still, Beyond thought’s reach, though not beyond love's will, For soul to All. And some I call my friends, and make believe Their spirits grieve, Brood, and rejoice vyith mine; T talk to them in ph Over the wine; ases quaint and fine I tellthem all my secrets ; touch their hands; One understands Perhaps. How har he tries To speak! And yet those glorious mild eyes, His best replies! I even have my croriies, one or two, My cherished few. But ah, they do not Stay! For the sun fades them and they pass away, As I grow gray. Yet while they last how actual they seem! Their faces beam ; I give them ail their] 5 names, Beliiod The Arras © 2010 Forgotten Books www. forgottenbooks. orgBertram and Gilbert, James, Each with his aims; One thinks he is a poet His friends rehearse; Another is full of law; A third sees pictures araw Without a flaw. Louis, Frank and , and writes verse which his hand can Strangest of all, they never rest. Day long They shift and throng, Moved by invisible will, Like a great breath w sill, And then is still; it shakes my lovely mal Squall after squall, hich puffs across my Inikins on the wall; Gast upon crowding gust, Tt sweeps them willy n With glory or lust. It is the world-ghost, t None knows where fro The viewless draughty Behind ally like blown dust time-spirit, come tide © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgAnd wash of being. I hear it yaw and glide, And then subside, Along these ghostly corridors and halls Like faint footfalls; The hangings stir in the air; And when I start and chailenge, ‘‘ Who goes here? ”’ Itjanswers, ‘¢ Where ?”’ The wail and sob and moan of the sca’s dirge, Its plangor and surge; The awful biting sough Of drifted snows along some arctic bluff, That veer and luff, And have the vacant boding human cry, Ag they go by ; — Isjit a banished soul oesing the dark like a distractcd mole Under a knoll? Like some invisible hcnchman old and gray, Day after day I hear it come and go, With stealthy swift unmeaning to and fro, Muttcring low, Behind 7 Arras © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. orgCeaseless and dait and terrible and blind, Like a Jost mind. 1 often chill with fear When { bethink me, What if it should peer At my shoulder here! Perchance he drives the merry-go-round whose track Is the zodiac; His name is No-man’s-friend ; And his gabbling parrot-talk has neither trend, Beginning, nor end. A prince of madness too, I'd cry, “A rat!” And lunge thereat, — Let out at one swift thrust The cunning arch-delusion of the dust Iso mistrust, But that I fear I should disclose a face Wearing the trace Of my own human guise, Pitcous, unharmful, loving, sad, and wise, With the speaking eyes. Behind he Avras 8 © 2010 Forgotten Books www.forgottenbooks. org