Poems (Piatt)/Volume 1/The Brother's Hand

by Sarah Piatt

THE BROTHER'S HAND. [Time: The Civil War, 1861-1868.]

Here, see what I have brought you from the hill—
 A brier-rose lingering late into July.
Oh, it may tell you, if it can and will,
 In its small way, so pink and timid, why
It waited after all its mates were dead,
And wore for mourning-garments only red
 While its step-mother month was fierce and dry.

There is no flower with look and bloom and breath,
 I fondly fancy, like the faint brier-rose;
No flower so fair for life, so sweet for death,
 That in the dew or in the darkness grows;
No flower that has so faërily heard and seen
What faëry things the hum and honey mean,
 When in the wind the bee about it blows.

Far off, by black-grey stone, in shattered heaps,
 The beautiful, familiar, sad home-grace,
Like love itself made palpable, it keeps
 Through all the sorrowful forsaken place.
Nor can you find the scented presence there,
On the green ground or in the pensive air,
 Of any other of the blossoming race.

A very lovely woman loved to wear
 Its cluster of blushes once upon her breast.
She brought it from the woods and set it where
 She always loved to be, herself, the best.
The very flowers we think so frail outstay
Our frailer selves—and she is gone away:
 Away—and, therefore, as we think, to rest.

On the seventh birthday of her fair twin-boys,
 She gave the two a boat, as they were one,
(For until then each owned the other's toys);
 But when they saw it floating in the sun,
With sails of stainéd silk so prettily blown,
Each felt that he was now himself alone:
 The golden chain that bound them was undone.

"No, it is mine," each to the other said,
 And one raised up an angry arm and made
A quick wide wound, that looked so strange and red
 Each of the other dimly felt afraid.
Then a child-Cain in shadowy terror stood,
And, crying from the ground, his brother's blood
 Rose from the pleasant shore where they had played.

That sharp, swift cut had cleft the two apart.
 And, under his light, lovely hair, one wore
A strange-shaped scar. And in the other's heart,
 A heart that had been very sweet before,
The snake-like passions started from their sleep
And over it began to writhe and creep.
 And so the two were two for evermore,

As they grew older, he who wore the scar
 Saw it was like a hand—his brother's hand,
It seemed, against him. Then he went afar
 With a kind kinsman to a colder land,
After he heard the dust begin to fall
On his young mother's coffin. She was all
 He had dear. And she was what the shadows are.

Blue-eyed and stately, with a bright, brave scorn
 Of wrong, he in a calmer climate grew.
The other, tropic-nursed as tropic-born,
 Was fierce and swarthy, and imperious too,
And restless as the wind that bloweth where
It listeth: so he wandered here and there.
 And neither of the other clearly knew.

At last there came a heavy hail of lead
 Out of the Northern sky, that Southward fell.
The fields were blasted and the men lay dead;
 The women moaned; and flying shapes of shell
Their ways from roof to hearth-stone madly tore,
And opened suddenly the deserted door,
 By the brier-roses guarded once so well

And Ruin glided up the weedy path,
 And crossed the mouldy threshold and went in,
And sat there, with a sort of a sullen wrath,
 Gathering about her all that once had been
Dear and familiar—save the rose, beside
The crumbling porch, from which she vainly tried,
 Tearing her hands with thorns, the flowers to win.

And once, when a great ghastly Sight close by
 Was terrible in the stillness of the moon,
A tall, slight soldier, with a smothered cry.
 Crept close and broke some buds and vanished soon;
But, with an almost human joy-in-grief,
The desolate rose-tree thrilled from root to leaf
 When he said wearily: "Yes—it is I."

A whole year more, when summer flushed again,
 Near to the same place, in the glitter of heat,
(The earth was red, the sky was smoky then,)
 One lay in agony. Against his feet
A gashed and gory flag from its shot staff
Fluttered and fell. There was a cruel laugh
 From one he had not feared again to meet;

And a swift horse, deep-black, with foaming mouth
 And angry eyes full of wild wonder, sprung
From its light rider—one who loved the South
 With his whole bitter soul. And, as he flung
The reins away and stood in tears beside
The dying creature, gentle, till it died,
 He showed that he was desperate, dark, and young,

There was a beautiful and dreadful charm
 About that youthful captain, as he stood
Bare-headed, swordless, with his dead right arm
 Loose at his side, his left, whose strength was good,
About his horse—forgetting his own wound,
Forgetting all the horrible things around—
 Calling it all the tender names he could.

But when his horse was gone, he turned away
 And stamped the fallen flag and cursed, and shook
The tall, slight soldier in whose blood it lay,
 Till he half-raised himself with a dim look,
That made the other loose his hateful hold
And tremble for an instant and grow cold,
 As if his thought some deadly trouble took.

Then he crept closer to the wounded youth
 And lifted, vaguely, his light lovely hair,
And that strange scar—the brother's hand, in truth
 Against him—as in distant days was there.
But now that brother looked at his distress
With a remorse that changed to tenderness,
 And tried to raise him with a timid care.

And watched him many a moaning after-night,
 Through which the shine of spectral steel would go,
Through which lost armies would rise up and fight
 Lost battles, in the air—then waver slow
And haze-like down, and whiten toward the dust,
Leaving behind a little blood and rust
 And glory. Glory? Why, I do not know.

At last the War's fierce music left the wind,
 And they who answered to its infinite cries
With their whole breath were gone where God can find
 Them, when He searches land and sea and skies
And Peace remained—a beautiful white veil,
Wrought by hurt hands that dropped off thin and pale,
 To hide the tears in wan, wet, restless eyes.

And the twin-brothers—one just from his wound—
 Talked of their brier-rose that would blossom yet,
Talked of the river with its far-back sound,
 Talked of their mother with a still regret,
And of the fairy boat she gave them both:
And then a sudden silence showed them loth
 To talk of—what they did not quite forget.

Just then it happened that a pretty flash
 Of small Spring-lightning made their window bright:
They saw a fluttering dress, a bright-plaid sash,
 A wide straw-hat, and loose hair falling quite
Half-way to eager feet. And so they guessed,
Each in a shy half-dreaming way, the rest:
 They thought the girl was lovely? They were right.

Her face in glimpses came to haunt the two,
 Her voice was not what common voices are;
And soon the twin-born rivals darkly knew
 The old feud was not dead. They saw the scar
Out of its dreary quiet rise again:
The brother's hand was terrible and plain
 Against the brother, as in years afar.

She loved them both. Which most? I think that she—
 At least not yet—nor any other knew.
Sometimes she walked with Frederick by the sea,
 Sometimes she sung a tremulous song to Hugh,
And in a while, no doubt, began to know
That he was handsome, or she thought him so,
 And that his eyes, perhaps, were frankly blue.

Out with the darker brother once, a storm
 Broke sharply down the twilight. For a time
She clung to him. But, dry again and warm,
 Among their lamps she sung a sobbing rhyme
To her piano—and the gold-haired man—
Whose desolate music ended and began
 With a far, subtle, creeping, sea-like chime.

Then hushed and went half-tearful to her room,
 Asking herself but this: "Which shall I choose
Have I the saddest need of light or gloom?
 The fair one surely is too fair to lose:
Without him half the world were empty, and
Without his brother———if I understand,
 The dark one is too dark to quite refuse.

"And sometimes if I only glance at him,
 His richer, fiercer colour seems to me
To make his stiller brother look as dim
 As a star looks by lightning. Let me be,
My star, with the white constant light you shed;
Fade out, my lightning, or else strike me dead.
 For star and lightning can but ill agree."

But something startled her brown window-bird,
 Nested below in perfume. As it flew
She heard her own name spoken, and she heard,
 Out in the wind, one ask: "Which of us two?
It is not well that both of us should stay.
Let her decide." In a bewildered way,
 Not knowing what she did, she whispered, "Hugh."

They heard below, and Frederick seemed to laugh,
 And said: "My boy, our paths again divide.
Your joy is great. If you could give me half,
 Enough were left. Good-bye. The world is wide,
But all too narrow to hold you and me.
Good-bye———and shall we let the Future be%
 Upon my faith you have a charming bride."

Next morning he was gone. And then, somehow,
 Hugh chanced in his vexed dreamy way to throw
The yellow hair from his unquiet brow,
 And started from a glass which seemed to show
That fearful scar, looking more deadly-white,
More like his brother's hand, too, since last night;
 Then scarlet suddenly it seemed to grow.

She saw it: "Ah, you have a scar," she said.
 "How strange it is—and how much like a hand."
It is a hand," he answered. "See how red
 It threatens now. It cut the gentle band
Between us while we yet were children." "Who ?"
"We twins that called each other Fred and Hugh,
 And played beside a river in the sand."

A troubled paleness fell upon her face.
 She looked at him an instant. "If I may?"
She said, and, bird-like, fluttered from her place,
 And flushed and doubted, and—I must not say
She kissed the scar. But I can say it grew
Yet deeper scarlet, and looked darker too,
 And seemed to move—motioning her away.

. . . The leaf-bloom of the Autumn lit the woods—
 (The next day was to be their wedding-day).
A cruel rain whirled down in pitiless floods
 And fretted the poor leaves that tried to stay
And wear their splendour for a little yet.
The butterflies were faded out and wet,
 Or else the wind had blown them all away.

The crimson-curtained, pleasant parlour glowed
 'With ferns and asters, and a sparkling fire;
The next-day's bride before the mirror showed
 The trailing mistiness of a bride's attire.
And Hugh looked at her, smiling from his dream:
He was not happy, quite, nor did he seem;
 Yet such sweet vanity he must admire.

She turned to take a letter that came in,
 And read it, and looked at him as she read,
And threw it at his feet. "And be your sin,"
 She hoarsely whispered, upon your own head."
"My sin?" "See there, and—say it is not true."
"I will not. All I say is this: if you
 Believe it—let to-morrow not begin!"

Then there were angry words, and—"Let us part,"
 She moaned, and reached to him her frightened hand,
Thinking that he would hold it—to his heart—
 And kiss her pain away, as she had planned:
For she forgave him—what he had not done.
He answered: "As you please." And there was none
 To come between them, or to understand.

What then? The thistles blew across the rain,
 The grey, wet thorn-tree glimmered once and shook.
She thought: "If one should never come again—
 Should never come—after a bitter look?"
And—the dry asters from the mantel fell:
She brought no fresh ones for the vases. Well!
 And silence settled in his favourite book.

She did not thin her beauty with her tears,
 But was she tearless? Doubtless she was not.
But all the outward gladness of her years
 Was not because of one great grief forgot.
Loose hair and laughter, singing quick and sweet,
Followed about the green home-grass her feet,
 And quieted all wordless, kindly fears.

She had no mother. But her father said:
 "You are too hasty, little girl, I fear.
Hugh is a manly fellow; as for Fred
 The villain! Hugh will come again, my dear,
Before the fashion of your dress shall change,
And we shall have our wedding." Was it strange?
 The dress grew quaint. And Hugh did not appear.

———Once at the sea-side, in an evening dance.
 She felt—and, fluttering, tried to fly away—
The bird-like terror of the snake-like glance.
 Poor, charméd little thing—and must it stay?
"Frederick?" "Well—yes." "Where is your brother, Hugh?"
"Am I my brother's keeper? Doubtless you
 Who wounded and deserted him, can say."

Hurt and bewildered, then she brokenly tried
 The secret of his letter to recall.
His letter? With feigned anger he denied
 That he had written—anything at all!
"What a mysterious piece of villainy!
Hugh never could have thought so ill of me.
 He did not read it%" Then he heard her fall.

. . . It was the crowded room, and they must go
 Into the wide moonlighted air apart.
Where was his brother, then? He said, to know
 He would give up the last throb of his heart;
It was two years or more since he had heard
Of Hugh one word, one single precious word:
 Then broke into a cry that made her start.

By dim degrees he made himself grow dear,
 By seeming everything his brother was.
Whatever in the other had been clear,
 In him she saw—darkly as in a glass.
At last, in some weird, subtle way, he grew
The shadow, or the very self, of Hugh.
 And—well, the Summer withered from the grass.

What then? The asters in the vases glowed
 Again; the parlour held the shining fire
Again; the mirror, three years older, showed
 The trailing mistiness of a bride's attire;
And, this time, Frederick watched her from his dream.
He was not happy, quite, nor did he seem,
 Yet such fair vanity he must admire.

Once more the thistles blew across the rain,
 The grey, wet thorn-tree glimmered once and shook;
And then she thought: "If one should come again—
 Or should not come—after a bitter look!"
And then—a sudden voice, familiar-low,
And phantom-sweet, but heavily-bent and slow,
 Read out the silence of the favourite book.

No matter. In a wedded year or two,
 In a far Western land a cottage rose,
With sand and sea and sea-shell shining through
 Its many windows—so the story goes.
Frederick was happy there. But his late bride
Had backward-yearning eyes, and sometimes sighed
 A little—as all women may? Who knows?

Once bitterly he asked: "What makes you sad?"
 She answered languidly: "Perhaps the sea.
I sometimes think it surely has gone mad:
 It foams and mutters till it frightens me.
Sometimes when it looks only golden, and
All things look golden in this Golden Land,
 Blackly below it threatens things to be."

And, as her childish words failed at her lip,
 From silks and spices and a foreign sail,
She saw a man drop from a landing ship
 As heavily as he had been a bale
Of precious merchant-freight. With the great light
Of the great evening smitten, he was bright—
 But all who looked at him were dull and pale.

A lifeboat brought him strangling to the coast.
 He motioned them, in a despairing way,
To drown his body. For his soul was lost,
 He said: it shook him off and plunged away
From the dark deck into the gulfs below,
For utter loneliness. And he must go
 And find it, somewhere—for the Judgment Day.

Then he died smiling. . . . Frederick and his wife
 Looked at him and each other, and then wound
Their arms about him. What was calm or strife
 To him or them? What had they lost and found?
What thing was near? What things were gone afar?
With tears, and without words, they kissed the scar—
 His brother's hand against him all his life.