Joaquin Murietta

JOAQUIN MURIETTA.

Joaquin Miller

Glintings of day in the darkness,

Flashings of flint and of steel,

Blended in gossamer texture

The ideal and the real,

Limn'd like the phantom ship shadow,

Crowding up under the keel.

stand beside the mobile sea,
And sails are spread, and sails are furl'd;
From farthest corners of the world,
And fold like white wings wearily.
Some ships go up, and some go down
In haste, like traders in a town.
Afar at sea some white ships flee,
With arms stretch'd like a ghost's to me,
And cloud-like sails are blown and curl'd,
Then glide down to the under world.
As if blown bare in winter blasts
Of leaf and limb, tall naked masts
Are rising from the restless sea.
I seem to see them gleam and shine
With clinging drops of dripping brine.
Broad still brown wings flit here and there,
Thin sea-blue wings wheel everywhere,
And white wings whistle through the air;
I hear a thousand sea gulls call.
And San Francisco Bay is white
And blue with sail and sea and light.
* * * * * * * *
Behold the ocean on the beach
Kneel lowly down as if in prayer,
I hear a moan as of despair,
While far at sea do toss and reach
Some things so like white pleading hands.
The ocean's thin and hoary hair
Is trail'd along the silver'd sands,
At every sigh and sounding moan.
The very birds shriek in distress
And sound the ocean's monotone.
'Tis not a place for mirthfulness,
But meditation deep, and prayer,
And kneelings on the salted sod,
Where man must own his littleness
And know the mightiness of God.
Dared I but say a prophecy,
As sang the holy men of old,
Of rock-built cities yet to be
Along these shining shores of gold,
Crowding athirst into the sea,
What wondrous marvels might be told!
Enough, to know that empire here
Shall burn her loftiest, brightest star;
Here art and eloquence shall reign,
As o'er the wolf-rear'd realm of old;
Here learn'd and famous from afar,
To pay their noble court, shall come,
And shall not seek or see in vain,
But look and look with wonder dumb.
Afar the bright Sierras lie
A swaying line of snowy white,
fringe of heaven hung in sight
Against the blue base of the sky.
I look along each gaping gorge,
I hear a thousand sounding strokes
Like giants rending giant oaks,
Or brawny Vulcan at his forge;
I see pickaxes flash and shine;
Hear great wheels whirling in a mine.
Here winds a thick and yellow thread,
A moss'd and silver stream instead;
And trout that leap'd its rippled tide
Have turn'd upon their sides and died.
Lo! when the last pick in the mine
Lies rusting red with idleness,
And rot yon cabins in the mold,
And wheels no more croak in distress,
And tall pines reassert command,
Sweet bards along this sunset shore
Their mellow melodies will pour;
Will charm as charmers very wise,
Will strike the harp with master hand,
Will sound unto the vaulted skies,
The valor of these men of old—
These mighty men of 'Forty-nine;
Will sweetly sing and proudly say,
Long, long agone there was a day
When there were giants in the land.
* * * * * * *
Now who rides rushing on the sight
Hard down yon rocky long defile,
Swift as an eagle in his flight,
Fierce as a winter's storm at night
Blown from the bleak Sierra's height!
Such reckless rider!-I do ween
No mortal man his like has seen.
And yet, butt for his long serape
All flowing loose, and black as crape,
And long silk locks of blackest hair
All streaming wildly in the breeze,
You might believe him in a chair,
Or chatting at some country fair
He rides so grandly at his ease.
But now he grasps a tighter rein,
A red rein wrought in golden chain,
And in his tapidaros stands,
Turns, shouts defiance at his foe.
And now he calmly bares his brow
As if to challenge fate, and now
His hand drops to his saddle-bow
And clutches something gleaming there
As if to something more than dare.
The stray winds lift the raven curls,
Soft as a fair Castilian girl's,
And bare a brow so manly, high,
Its every feature does belie
The thought he is compell'd to fly;
A brow as open as the sky
On which you gaze and gaze again
As on a picture you have seen
And often sought to see in vain,
A brow of blended pride and pain,
That seems to hold a tale of woe
Or wonder, that you fain would know
A boy's brow, cut as with a knife,
With many a dubious deed in life.
Again he grasps his glitt'ring rein,
And, wheeling like a hurricane,
Defying wood, or stone, or flood,
Is dashing down the gorge again.
Oh, never yet has prouder steed
Borne master nobler in his need!
There is a glory in his eye
That seems to dare and to defy
Pursuit, or time, or space, or race.
His body is the type of speed,
While flom his nostril to his heel
Are muscles as if made of steel.
What crimes have made that red hand red?
What wrongs have written that young face
With lines of thought so out of place?
Where flies he? And from whence has fled?
And what his lineage and race?
What glitters in his heavy belt,
And from his furr'd cantenas gleam?
What on his bosom that doth seem
A diamond bright or dagger's hilt?
The iron hoofs that still resound
Like thunder from the yielding ground
Alone reply; and now the plain,
Quick as you breathe and gaze again,
Is w0n, and all pursuit is vain.
* * * * * * *
I stand upon a mountain rim,
Stone-paved and pattern'd as a street;
A rock-lipp'd canon plunging south,
As if it were earth's open'd mouth,
Yawns deep and darkling at my feet;
So deep, so distant, and so dim
Its waters wind, a yellow thread,
And call so faintly and so far,
I turn aside my swooning head.
I feel a fierce impulse to leap
Adown the beetling precipice,
Like some lone, lost, uncertain star;
To plunge into a place unknown,
And win a world, all, all my own;
Or if I might not meet that bliss,
At least escape the curse of this.
I gaze again. A gleaming star
Shines back as from some mossy well
Reflected from blue fields afar.
Brown hawks are wheeling here and there,
And up and down the broken wall
Clings clumps of dark green chapparal,
While from the rent rocks, grey and bare;
Blue junipers hang in the air.
Here, cedars sweep the stream and here,
Among the boulders moss'd and brown
That time and storms have toppled down
From towers undefiled by man,
Low cabins nestle as in fear.
And look no taller than a span.
From low and shapeless chimneys rise
Some tall straight columns of blue smoke,
And weld them to the bluer skies;
While sounding down the somber gorge
I hear the steady pickax stroke,
As if upon a flashing forge.
* * * * * * *
Another scene, another sound!—
Sharp shots are fretting through the air,
Red knives are flashing everywhere,
And here and there the yellow flood
Is purpled with warm smoking blood.
The brown hawk swoops low to the ground,
And nimble chipmunks, small and still,
Dart striped lines across the sill
That manly feet shall press no more.
The flume lies warping in the sun,
The pan sits empty by the door,
The pickax on its bedrock floor,
Lies rusting in the silent mine.
There comes no single sound nor sign
Of life, beside yon monks in brown
That dart their dim shapes up and down
The rocks t hat swelter in the sun;
But dashing down yon rocky spur,
Where scarce a hawk would dare to whirr,
A horseman holds his reckless flight.
He wears a flowing black capote,
While over all do flow and float
Long locks of hair as dark as night,
And hands are red that erst were white.
All up and down the land to-day
Black desolation and despair
It seems have set and settled there,
With none to frighten them away.
Like sentries watching by the way
Black chimneys topple in the air,
And seem to say, Go back, beware!
While up around the mountain's rim
Are clouds of smoke, so still and grim
They look as they are fasten'd there.
A lonely stillness, so like death,
So touches, terrifies all things,
That even rooks that fly o'erhead
Are hush'd, and seem to hold their breath,
To fly with muffled wings,
And heavy as if made of lead.
Some skulls that crumble to the touch,
Some joints of thin and chalk-like bone,
A ta l l black chimney, all alone,
That leans as if upon a crutch.
Alone are left to mark or tell,
Instead of cross or cryptic stone,
Where Joaquin stood and brave men fell.
* * * * * * *
The sun is red and flush'd and dry,
And fretted from his weary beat
Across the hot and desert sky,
And swollen as from overheat,
And failing too; for see, he sinks
Swift as a ball of burnish'd ore:
It may be fancy, but methinks
I hear the neighing of hot steeds,
I see the marshaling of men
That silent move among the trees
As busily as swarming bees
With step and stealthiness profound,
On carpetings of spindled weeds,
Without a syllable or sound
Save clashing of their burnished arms,
Clinking dull, deathlike alarms—
Grim bearded men and brawny men
That grope among the ghostly trees.
Were ever silent men as these?
Was ever somber forest deep
And dark as this? Here one might sleep
While all the weary years went round,
Nor wake nor weep for sun or sound.
A stone's throw to the right, a rock
Has rear'd his head among the stars—
An island in the upper deep—
And on his front a thousand scars
Of thunder's crash and earthquake's shock
Are seam'd as if by sabre's sweep
Of gods, enraged th,t he should rear
His front amid their realms of air.
What moves along his beetling brow,
So small, so indistinct and far,
This side yon blazing evening star,
Seen through that redwood's shifting bough?
A lookout on the world below?
A watcher for the friend-or foe?
This still troops sentry it must be,
Yet seems no taller than my knee.
But for the grandeur of this gloom,
And for the chafing steeds' alarms,
And brown men's sullen clash of arms,
This were but as a living tomb.
These weeds are spindled, pale and white,
As if nor sunshine, life, nor light
Had ever reach'd this forest's heart.
Above, the redwood boughs entwine
As dense as copse of tangled vine—
Above, so fearfully afar,
It seems as'twere a lesser sky,
A sky without a moon or star,
The moss'd boughs are so thick and high.
At every lisp of leaf I start!
Would I could hear a cricket trill,
Or hear you sentry from his hill,
The place does seem so deathly still.
But see a sudden lifted hand
From one who still and sullen stands,
With black serape and bloody hands,
And coldly gives his brief command.
They mount-away! Quick on his heel
He turns and grasps his gleaming steel—
Then sadly smiles, and stoops to kiss
An upturn'd face so sweetly fair,
So sadly, saintly, purely rare,
So rich of blessedness and bliss!
I know she is not flesh and blood,
But some sweet spirit of this wood;
I know it by her wealth of hair,
And step on the unyielding air;
Her seamless robe of shining white,
Her soul-deep eyes of darkest night;
But over all and more than all
That can be said or can befall,
That tongue can tell or pen can trace,
That wonderous witchery of face.
Between the trees I see him stride
To where a red steed fretting stands
Impatient for his lord's commands:
And she glides noiseless at his side.
One hand toys with her waving hair,
Soft lifting from her shoulders bare;
The other holds the loosen'd rein,
And rests upon the swelling mane
That curls the curved neck o'er and o'er,
Like waves that swirl along the shore
He hears the last retreating sound
Of iron on volcanic stone,
That echoes far from peak to plain,
And'neath the dense wood's sable zone,
He peers the dark Sierras down.
His hand forsakes her raven hair,
His eyes have an unearthly glare;
She shrinks and shudders at his side
Then lifts to his her moisten'd eyes,
And only looks her sad replies.
A sullenness his soul enthralls,
A silence born of hate and pride;
His fierce volcanic heart so deep
Is stirr'd, his teeth, despite his will,
Do chatter as if in a chill;
His very dagger at his side
Does shake and rattle in its sheath,
As blades of brown grass in a gale
Do rustle on the frosted heath:
And yet he does not bend or weep,
But sudden mounts, then leans him o'er
To breathe her hot breath but once more.
I do not mark the prison'd sighs,
I do not meet the moisten'd eyes,
The while he leans him from his place
Down to her sweet uplifted face.
A low sweet melody is heard
Like cooing of some Balize bird,
So fine it does not touch the air,
So faint it stirs not anywhere;
Faint as the falling of the dew,
Low as a pure unutter'd prayer,
The meeting, mingling, as it were,
In that one long, last, silent kiss
Of souls in paradisal bliss.
"You must not, shall not, shall not go!
To die and leave me here to die!
Enough of vengeance, Love and I?
I die for home and-Mexico."
He leans, he plucks her to his breast,
As plucking Mariposa's flower,
And now she crouches in her rest
As resting in some rosy bower.
Erect, again he grasps the rein!
I see his black steed plunge and poise
And beat the air with iron feet,
And curve his noble glossy neck,
And toss on high his swelling mane,
And leap-away! he spurns the rein!
He flies so fearfully and fleet,
But for the hot hoofs' ringing noise
'Twould seem as if he were on wings
And they are gone! Gone like breath,
Gone like a white sail seen at night
A moment, and then lost to sight;
Gone like a star you look upon,
That glimmers to a bead, a speck,
Then softly melts into the dawn,
And all is still and dark as death,
And who shall sing, for who may know
That mad, glad ride to Mexico?

Home

Click here for more

Poetry

JOAQUIN MURIETTA.

Joaquin Miller