The Musmee

THE Musmee has brown-velvet eyes,

Curtained with satin, sleepily;

You wonder if those lids would rise

The newest, strangest sight to see!

Yet, when she chatters, laughs, or plays

Koto , or lute, or samisen --

No jewel gleams with brighter rays

Than flash from those dark lashes then.

The Musmee has a small brown face --

Musk-melon seed its perfect shape --

Arched, jetty eyebrows; nose to grace

The rosy mouth beneath; a nape,

And neck, and chin; and smooth soft cheeks,

Carved out of sun-burned ivory;

With teeth which, when she smiles or speaks,

Pearl merchants might come leagues to see!

The Musmee's hair could teach the night

How to grow dark, the raven's wing

How to seem ebon; grand the sight

When in rich masses towering.

She builds each high black-marble coil,

And binds the gold and scarlet in,

And thrusts, triumphant, through the toil

The Kanzâshi, her jewelled pin.

The Musmee has small, faultless feet,

With snow-white tabi trimly decked

Which patter down the city street

In short steps, slow and circumspect;

A velvet string between her toes

Holds to its place the unwilling shoe,

Pretty and pigeon-like she goes,

And on her head a hood of blue.

The Musmee wears a wondrous dress --

Kimôno, obi, imogi --

A rose-bush in spring-loveliness

Is not more color-glad to see!

Her girdle holds her silver pipe,

And heavy swing her long silk sleeves

With cakes, love-letters, mikans ripe,

Small change, musk-box, and writing leaves.

The Musmee's heart is slow to grief

And quick to pleasure, love, and song;

The Musmee's pocket-handkerchief,

A square of paper! All day long

Gentle, and sweet, and debonair

Is -- rich or poor -- this Asian lass,

Heaven have her in its tender care!

O medeto gozarimas!

Sir Edwin Arnold

A Song

ONCE -- and only once -- you gave

One rich gift, which Memory

Shuts within itself, to save

Sweet and fresh, while life may be:

Shuts it like a rose-leaf treasured

In the pages of a book,

Which we open, when heart-leisured,

Now and then -- softly to look.

If I told you of that gift

How and when, the tend'ring of it,

Would you, out of rose-leaf thrift,

Claim from me the rend'ring of it?

That might make it two for one

('Twas of such unwonted kind!)

Half a mind I have to tell you

Not to tell you half a mind.

Sir Edwin Arnold

Sonnet to America

AMERICA! At this thy Golden Gate,

New travelled from those portals of the West,

Parting -- I make my reverence! It were best

With backward looks to quit a Queen in state!

Land of all lands most fair, and free, and great,

Of countless kindred lips, wherefrom I heard

Sweet speech of Shakespeare -- keep it consecrate

For noble uses! Land of Freedom's Bird,

Fearless and proud! so let him soar that, stirred

With generous joy, all lands may learn from thee

A larger life, and Europe, undeterred

By ancient dreads, dare also to be free

Body and Soul, seeing thine eagle gaze

Undazzled, upon Freedom's sun full-blaze.

Sir Edwin Arnold