{"id":86,"date":"2025-06-18T19:11:37","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T19:11:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.wpenginepowered.com\/?p=86"},"modified":"2025-07-09T20:18:18","modified_gmt":"2025-07-09T20:18:18","slug":"from-two-on-an-old-pathway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/?p=86","title":{"rendered":"from Two on an Old Pathway"},"content":{"rendered":"

from Two on an Old Pathway<\/em><\/strong>
\nby Eleanor O\u2019Rourke Koenig<\/strong><\/h2>\n

(Hartford: Edwin Valentine Mitchell, 1929)<\/p>\n

CONQUEST<\/h4>\n

She had a way
\nOf sweeping up a room
\nThen for a minute
\nHanging on the broom.<\/p>\n

Plumb in the middle\u2014
\nThere she would stand
\nHolding a broom
\nAnd the world in her hand.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

REFLECTION<\/h4>\n

Waving tree and a sunset sky\u2014
\nAnd which of beautiful things am I?
\nA leaf that is staying fastidious green
\nOr a leaf green-gold, where the sun may preen
\nOn his last, long light, or the breeze’s power
\nTo move a tree in the sunset hour,
\nOr the sun on a tree, or a bird I hear
\nIn his shaking nest without a fear
\nFor his wild-joy song he sings so high,
\nThe crown of it all\u2014and which am I,
\nA leaf, the breeze, the bird, the sun?<\/p>\n

I am all, I am every one<\/em>\u2014<\/p>\n

I am the neighboring house wall,
\nHolding reflection\u2014the shade of it all!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DAISY WHITE<\/h4>\n

I stood a while in deference
\nTo what that turn of road revealed;
\nA lifetime picture of surprise,
\nA sheer, white slope\u2014a daisy field!<\/p>\n

So sudden, beautiful and still,
\nI saw it just before the night\u2014
\nOf course I would not enter there
\nOr lift one stem of daisy white.<\/p>\n

And down below, across the road,
\nReflected in the pond’s smooth glass,
\nSo sharp, so shadowy, so rare,
\nI saw the mind’s own image pass!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

EVER SO FAIR<\/h4>\n

Ever so fair, oh, springtime, come again
\nOh, world, oh life, oh let this idyll be
\nThat you will bring again one spring for me,
\nMy childhood’s spring, as pleased, as rare as then\u2014
\nStand back oh mind, oh, heart, you women, men,
\nHold back the page you forced my eyes to see,
\nOh, let me stand again half-naked, free,
\nFall, laughing torrent, heal me, April rain.<\/p>\n

On woodland walks, on paths where blue flowers grow,
\nOh let me stand and hear a bird’s voice call,
\nOh, let me touch brown earth, a garden stem
\nOn paths I loved, so long, so long ago,
\nAnd say only of winter and of fall
\nFor tears I wept, I wish the spring for them.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THERE WAS A VISION….<\/h4>\n

There was a vision that was ever mine,
\nIn strangeling places it has bloomed most fair
\nAnd even when I forsook it, it was there,
\nChill rumors rose when it began to shine.
\nMad-glorious, still, I marked some trembling line,
\nI often ran; I would not dare to tarry.
\nWith sparks I left, with trails I could not carry,
\nStrange ghosts will rise to make dark nooks divine.<\/p>\n

Some lilt of song would spring from a rainbow fountain,
\nWould trouble me, some word, so sheer, alone,
\n“Hyacinth,” clearly, for a Chaldean stone.
\nMock faces looked, but I was on a mountain
\nOr in May fields where only white flowers grow
\nOr past the summer, gathering flowers of snow….<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

WINDOW VIEW<\/h4>\n

This room for me is isolate and still,
\nNear humdrum seems a thousand miles away,
\nThis window looking out across the day
\nMarks trees as uncombed hair upon a hill;
\nA sky so neutral, cloudless as to spill
\nMeek pathos on the walk that leads a way
\nAcross a field\u2014where ruts reclaim today
\nWhat sameness had engendered in a will?<\/p>\n

So do I ever shape a scene to mind . . .
\nWhat phantom footsteps flock upon the air,
\nThat path ascends the hill, or anywhere,
\nDo I recall the dream of steps that wind,
\nOne figure now upon the summit there,
\nTo match my mood eternally inclined?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

AFTER AN OLD IRISH METER<\/h4>\n

What is the answer, mountain, this dark night for her;
\nDark, deep, bitterly chill the tale this night has to tell;
\nThis silencing, covering, burying sheet, her heart’s own well,
\nIs frozen now and will not stir.<\/p>\n

A terrible, terrible grief is this, it seems;
\nThe core of all beautiful things, I think, is frozen now.
\nIf it should break, mountain, you tremble, knowing how
\nYou would be overthrown by streams.<\/p>\n

Yet you must pity her and ponder on this thing,
\nDark, brooding, lonely, of you she was, which made the night
\nOf all that is locked in now\u2014beautiful, piercing, bright,
\nThat frozen bird that came to sing.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DECREE<\/h4>\n

This is the thing that you have done to me,
\nRankled injustice meetly in my mind,
\nAnd long ago I should have turned to flee,
\nBut now, the fixture of your fate, I find
\nMy mind enchanted, conquered of my will,
\nWith careful eyes constrained to follow out
\nYour set gyrations moving in and out
\nThe course you have laid out meticulously.<\/p>\n

Why do you hold me\u2014when I think to speak
\nMy mind to you, still something holds me back
\nAnd often I would turn and run away
\nBut stand stock-rooted\u2014this is what I seek
\nAnd fear, and know, I, too, must bear the rack
\nWhen you will stand and face the truth some day.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE ROAD<\/h4>\n

So soon, so soon she would<\/em> not disbelieve
\nEngendered dreams, uplifting him a god
\nAs she had done before he placed the ring
\nUpon her finger, making her his wife,
\n“Wife,” she had breathed, and therewith had become
\nThe homily of what his wife must be
\nSinging amidst the roughest household task
\nWith tired, slim fingers. . .
\n                                                        When she saw him scan
\nHer littleness beside a spreading form
\nIt did not cause a heart throb, for by then
\nPerforce she had appraised him. . . .
\n                                                                            It had come,
\nThis truth she did not dare look in the eyes,
\nSo shortly after he had brought her home\u2014
\nHis temper rising like an angry gust
\nThen sinking to a wheedling attitude.
\nAt first, in terror she had almost swooned,
\nThen came a headlong sorrow for his fault,
\nMaternal sorrow, as for a spoiled child. . . .
\nToo soon, too soon, the wheedling air wore off
\nThen came the wifely void she could not fill
\nWhich seemed a trivial thing beside the fear
\nWhich had begun to grow, an ominous cloud
\nThrough which she looked at life with startled eyes,
\nViewing the havoc that his anger made
\nWith others, cattle, men, even with her. . . .
\nOne day she clasped a tree and prayed to God
\nThen started down the road\u2014and then ran back
\nChained by that counter-fear. She tried again
\nBut seemed to see him looking from somewhere\u2014
\nAgain she tried . . . again. . . .<\/p>\n

                                                            Twelve months a wife,
\nOne night she watched him count his growing hoard
\nCounted against her body. Strangely wise,
\nShe watched the soiled dollars, saw his face
\nNarrowly eager, saw his scheming eyes,
\nHis cruel mouth, his shoulders stooped with greed,
\nSaw him so plainly, with the veil removed,
\nThe shimmering veil her girlish dreams had woven,
\nSaw him a miser . . . silent and afraid,
\nShe crouched before the stove . . . then he stood up.
\nNot given much to talk, he talked that night,
\nTold her about a fire that had burned down
\nEd Higgins’ shack, and money, too,, had burned,
\nGuess, after all, a bank was the safe place
\nFor money earned so hard. Then press his clothes,
\nHis Sunday clothes tomorrow\u2014and on time!\u2014
\nTo town, her query, even as a thought,
\nA plan, too quickly mounted to her brain\u2014
\nYes, to town, tomorrow\u2014and alone!
\nThat night as he lay snoring on the bed
\nShe sat so still and told a tremulous star
\nThe things she could not speak. The moonlight showed
\nA gleaming, rippling, golden thing\u2014the Road!<\/p>\n

Once it had been her mother in the night<\/em>
\nAnd once a velvet carpet strewn with roses\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Then, as she looked, a cloud obscured the moon
\nAnd, fearfully, she crept down by his side.<\/p>\n

Fate looked and laughed and gave a humorous twist
\nTo this strange tragedy. Next day she rose
\nAlert, to mind his needs with aptitude,
\nOutside she aired his clothes upon the line,
\nHer skirts carousing in the April gale,
\nAnd all the world seemed free as April wind.<\/p>\n

One magic moment she could run with it!<\/em><\/p>\n

Inside she heated up the heavy iron,
\nHasty for time, for time was on her then.
\nAt ten\u2014and sharp\u2014he would come from the field\u2026<\/p>\n

Outside the world seemed free as April wind. . . .<\/em><\/p>\n

She brought the dampened clothes and pressed the seams,
\nYet strangely watched the wind that ran away,
\n“Come out,” it cried, “come out away with me,
\n“Come out,” it cried\u2014
\n                                                   The room was black with smoke\u2014
\nShe looked and saw the ruin of burning clothes,
\nHaphazardly the iron sat on the coat,
\nAnd dug a grave, a soft, warm, mussy grave,
\nOn the left side, where a man’s heart should be\u2014
\nHis Sunday clothes\u2014she saw the dollars there\u2014
\nCome out, come out,”\u2014
\n                                                      She screamed, then laughed, in fear,
\nThen heard the ticking clock upon the wall\u2014<\/em><\/p>\n

With some slow haste she lifted up the iron
\nAnd placed it on the stove, and held aloft
\nThe coat and saw the hole burned, burned in deep,
\nOn the left side, where a man’s heart should be.<\/em><\/p>\n

Her rough old sweater hung against the wall,
\nShe grabbed it, half unknowing it was there,
\nBecause of time\u2014then, darting through the door,
\nShe fled, she fled and joined the April wind
\nWhich even then took on a lighter tone,
\nAlthough such things she could not heed or know,
\nFor helter-skelter down the road she ran….<\/p>\n

The road, the road, the light and running road,
\nThe road\u2026.<\/p>\n

                         She ran a mile, or ten, or more,
\nFree, free, with wild, strange laughter on her lips,
\nFree, free at last\u2014fear had outwitted fear!
\nThese words she mumbled over and over again,
\nFear had outwitted fear….<\/p>\n

                                                        She stood quite still
\nAgainst a tree and in a moment there
\nShe lived again that year, how he had come,
\nA knight, to fill her lonely girlish dreams.
\nHow she had gone to live a country life,
\nTo be his wife, to live with him, and love\u2026.<\/p>\n

The wind had died away to tell this tale
\nTo some far hill or sea…she watched the sand
\nThat made the road and could have scooped it up
\nIn great, soft handfuls, could have knelt down there
\nAnd kissed the road, a mad, rapt, holy thing\u2026.<\/p>\n

A man came riding in a honking car,
\nLooked past a slender girl against a tree,
\nShe searched his weathered face and simple eyes.
\n“Going to town,” she shouted bravely then.
\n“Why, yes, jump in,” he said, and gave her room.
\nThey moved along . . . by woods, by fresh warm fields\u2014
\n\u201cAny work in town for girls, or do you know,”
\nShe asked him, shyly. “Work enough,” he said,
\n“Girls won’t stay long, they’re always marrying,”
\nHe laughed across his wrinkled face in glee.
\nShe looked ahead, and laughed\u2014and laughed again.
\nHe did not know her laughter was a prayer.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE LISTENER<\/h4>\n

Who is that knocking at my lonely door,
\nWho is that knocking again,
\nSo long I have waited, so long before,
\nAnd no one came knocking then.<\/p>\n

Waited alone for a voice never heard,
\nListened for feet to come by.
\nNow I must stand here, framing a word,
\nSpeech seems so strange and so shy.<\/p>\n

Still I must hasten for my amber comb,
\nFor my necklace and fine-set ring\u2014
\nIt may be a beggar, too tired to roam
\nBut it may be at last the King!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE SHADOW<\/h4>\n

They’re out at last, the words not said,
\nI’ve lied and lied, with silence, too,
\nIn January I came to dread
\nYour narrow look\u2014this grew and grew,
\nThis lovely thing. I often reached
\nWith careful hand and felt the air
\nAnd, feeling nothing, almost screeched,
\nFor he was surely sitting there!<\/em>
\nAnd even when you chopped away
\nThe chair where he would come and sit\u2014
\nTwo chairs block up a room, you’d say,
\nAnd one night made quick work of it\u2014
\nHe still was there. No neighbors came,
\nYou saw to that, no one passed by.
\nI almost could not speak my name.
\nYou broke the looking-glass\u2014don’t lie!
\nI hid the little piece behind
\nThe farthest board out in the shed\u2014
\nThink there’s something I can’t find?<\/em>
\nWhy, yes, there is, the shadow said.
\nSo that is how it came about,
\nI only had to think that way.
\nYou’ll never know what we<\/em> shut out
\nWhen you went into town that day.
\nShe’s safe, locked in<\/em>, you thought, but we,
\nWe almost danced the rafters down.
\nWhy, he is all that you might be\u2014<\/em>
\nYou’ll search and search the farthest town?
\nFind shadows under apple trees,
\nGo search forever, look behind
\nThe other locks, the other keys\u2014
\nYes, there is something you can’ t find!<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SHARPER SPRING<\/h4>\n

How do I know
\nSome spring you may
\nForgetful seem\u2014
\nYou may not miss me so
\nEven to say
\nIt was a dream.<\/p>\n

And I may sleep then
\nSo still and wan
\nUnder the ground,
\nWith never my heart again
\nTo free springs gone
\nWith its sound.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

WINTER AFTERNOON<\/h4>\n

No wind against the paler sky
\nTo rise again and then abate.
\nNo change in this monotony
\nThat even weather may create.<\/p>\n

Not even may a dream thought stir
\nTo thwart this certainty of hush,
\nMy eyes not even think despair
\nDepicted in a garden bush.<\/p>\n

But rest where topmost branches are
\nMore fine, more still, on stillest trees,
\nIdentically against the sky\u2014
\nI wait, as orderly as these.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[END OF SELECTION]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

from Two on an Old Pathway by Eleanor O\u2019Rourke Koenig (Hartford: Edwin Valentine Mitchell, 1929) CONQUEST She had a way Of sweeping up a room Then for a minute Hanging on the broom. Plumb in the middle\u2014 There she would stand Holding a broom And the world in her hand.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[12,33,34,32,31,30,10],"class_list":["post-86","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-eleanor-orourke-koenig","tag-feminism","tag-irish","tag-nature","tag-poem","tag-poetry","tag-womens-lives","tag-womens-rights"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=86"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=86"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=86"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=86"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}