Page:Anthology of Magazine Verse (1921).djvu/30

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MY GHOSTS
My house is filled with ghosts—Ghosts of all sorts that sing and dance,And fill the halls with laughter gay,And other ghosts that are contentTo be philosophers,And point the way to peace and happiness.Grim ghosts are there,Wan specters they of tragedy,Despairing in their mien,Compellers all of gloom,Who fill me full of horror as they pass,The which, when grown too tenseWith contemplation of their evil ways,I turn away from, summoningSome ghosts of lyric song to ease the strain,And find serenityThe while he, smiling, sings to me.The ghosts of all the famous folk of historyAre there:Wise Solomon and CharlemagneAnd Pericles and Plato; Socrates,And all the singers of the glory that was GreeceAnd Rome;Columbus, Cabot, and their crews,And Raleigh, brave pathfinders to our newer world;Sad Louis, and Robespierre of greenish eyes,The pallid Nemesis of kings;And he who lost at WaterlooComes now and then, and back to glory stalks,Rehearsing for my thrill the deeds of Lodi's bridgeAnd Austerlitz;While Washington's own self strides nobler by,Crowned with the greener baysOf his unselfishness;And Lincoln, heart of godlike mold,Comes hauntingly to stirMy soul alternately to laughter and to tears.

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