The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-11-16

A New Volume Of Charming Verse. by Evateen Stein. One of
i: /: the Most Gifted of Americas Younger Poets. I: !:

tumultuous spirit in The Northmen's
Song OF the Pole" and the lines to The
Winged Victory of Samothrace:"
Beneath the wan moon of the long artic night
The frost-smitten sea stretches boundless and
The shores OF the Dead Men loom spectral and
white,
In Helheim, the death-goddess waits for her
own.
But. no. to her hatred! The soul of the brave
He bears not who dares not her fury defy!
And. no. to her giants of wind and OF wave. az,
We crave but TO meet and defeat them or die'
Upon the Victory she looks.
Then suddenly DER everything
i see thee, storm-like, rushing past.
Thy hand upon the carven mast,
And harken whilst thy proud lips fling
The loud. triumphal trumpet blast.
"A Song of Thought" embodies the same
restless spirit. A different mood is ex-
pressed in "At Night" as witness these
lines:
o dearest heart. when all Is said.
I am afraid! And from the whole
Wide waste Of worlds L hide my sight.
And from the boundless night.
The ancient mystery of the skies,
Their silent depths from pole to pole,
The void, the vastness %terrifes!
%, let me rather search your eyes,
And with your sweet, warm touch dispense
This terror of the universe
That strikes into my soul!
''Over the Sierra" a vivid picture, closes
thus:
A sense OF majesties and nights.
An exaltation born of these;
The SUBMITS awful silences;
A glimpse of Godhead from the heightsI
There is a strong human note in "A
.Plea"-the dread that absence will lessen
the love Of a friend. Dream Echoes is a
common experience simply told:
A little while ago 1 caught,
In cadence pure and clear,
A wait of faintest music. wrought
Upon my inner ear.
A part Of some elusive theme
Whose sweetly solemn air
Ny soul had hardened In a dream.
Z know not when nor where.
i only know my heart strings stirred
With strange. forgotten pain,
That crept upon me as | heard
That unremembered strain.
A sense of loneliness untold.
So boundless. deep, unknown,
i blindly reached my hands TO hold
Your palms within my own!
Many lines tempt to quotation. The open
ing poem, that gives the title to the book,
Among the Trees Again." puts into words
what many feel but have not the power to
express, the sense of c~ompanionship with
the trees. The poem, ION Hearing the
Ballad of Allan Percy is in the same
measure as that melancholy old song and
has something of its haunting quality. I'm
the Mission Garden, San Gabriel" Is a fine
memorial tribute to that California relic
of the olden time. And there are man.
lighter bits. airy, graceful fancies. pictures
of sea and sky and flowers, expressions
of fitting moods. From cover to cover
is not a careless phrase, an unfinished line.
The utmost fastidiousness is characteristic
of every poem, yet one of the charms of
the authors work Is its seeming artless-
ness and ~unstudied simplicity. Hers is an
art that conceals art in a most effective
way.
Miss Stein is a conscientious worker, pur-
suing her literary undertakings in her own
way and as inspiration comes, unmoved by
the hurry and furry of the writing world
around her. The result speaks for itself
and puts her in a class far above the null
titude writing merely to get into print.
She is a genuine poet and her book is one
to read and treasure.
The volume, which is daintily bound in
green and white and attractively printed,
is inscribed to the memory Of her brother,
Orth Harper Stein, a gifted writer of
prose and verse, but who. as a news
paper man, was under the disadvantage Of
anonymity, with the consequence that many
of his most brilliant productions are yet
afloat with no name attached.