Jordan Mattox

In doing research for my next episode on the poet Joaquin Miller, I had the opportunity to meet the fascinating poet Minnie Myrtle. I leave off the Miller from her name given Miller absenteeism. Discovering forgotten poets like Myrtle is one of my great joys. In the episode on Miller, there was not time to post some of her poetry, so I am doing that here:

To the Poet Laborer
Your muse is sunny-faced and sweet,
….She meets you in the fairest nooks
Sequestered in some dim retreat,
….She reads with you from Nature’s books.
Her soft, magnetic thrill you feel,
….You love her presence, and she woos
Your languid moods but to reveal
….The soul of Nature’s veiled truths.
So mute and silent is her way
….The coarser mind can never heed,
She pleads with you to stay and stay
….And Nature’s subtle page to read.
To gather up the trifles sweet
….The busier eye can never see
And make the broken chains complete
….That link “finite infinity;”
The struggling mosses of the sod
….The weeds that vex the earth and curse
To hold them up and call them God
….The primal of the universe;
To probe the dreamy mystery wrought
….By insects rearing coral bars,
Then reach up with thy poet-thought
….And read the lives of all the stars;
To teach the weary, weary heart
….To rest and drink life’s sweetness in,
To draw the flimsy veil apart
….That shrouds the Beautiful in Sin.
She bids you lay your toil aside
….And gladly bear her magic wand,
And in her dreamy realms abide
….Till the dull world shall understand.
And little waifs that float unseen,
….Brushed by the careless hand away
Shall settle, wooed, in peace serene
….Upon the soul of man, and stay.

My muse, less kind, or more discreet,
….Deigns not my lonely steps to guide,
And never dares with me to meet
….Except with one or more beside.
She sent me forth amid the throng
….To toil, to trust and be betrayed,
To war with poverty and wrong,
….To hate, defy and be dismayed.
I heard love’s snow-white story, pale
….With sweet delights and blissful fear,
And the dear lips that told the tale
….Turned coldly from me with a sneer;
My holy faith was rudely slain
….In doubt, and clamor and distrust,
In sobs and darkness and in pain
….I saw it buried in the dust.
My dreams of fame—she hid them all
….Like corpses in lone graves at rest,
Amid the crowd I saw them fall,
….Amid the scornful laugh and jest.
For one sweet drop of bliss I plead
….With all the tintless dews and myrrh,
“Love hath a balm for thee,” she said,
….“But Sorrow is her messenger.”

She sets my face towards the west,
….Still pointing with her purple finger
Where suns are set in wild unrest
….And sable clouds do mourn and linger,
She haunts me when my soul is sad
….And bitter, filled with stings and wrongs,
She taunts me till my spirit’s mad
….And madness breathes in all my songs.
I hear the moan of dull, sad seas
….That cannot fall on other ears,
And if my lays seem phantasies
….And sneers too often rhyme with tears;
If in my songs the eagle’s shriek
….Doth hush the peaceful, cooing dove,
Still bear in mind I sing and seek
….The wayward truth of human love.
And deem my thoughts but atoms thrown
….From the new Faith that softly gleams
Far off in truth’s dim, chaos-dawn
….And in the dust of early dreams.
We have full time; “there is no death,”
….No need of toil or doubt or tears;
While I unfold a hidden faith
….Tell thou the mystery of the spheres.