BY KARLE WILSON BAKER

Orders

She is wise, the Ancient Mother,
Her ways are not our ways:
We cannot circumscribe her
Though we watch her all our days.

On each of her questioning children
She presses a different will:
To one she says, "Keep busy!"
To one she says, "Keep still!"

She said to me, "Wait and listen:

I have plenty to drive and do-
But, once in a while, when you are sure,
Speak out a word or two!"

The Cripple

A bird came hopping to my shelf
With one good foot-a stump the other:
It hurt my heart to see so maimed

A feathered brother.

Yet when he spread his wings to go,
He seemed to launch himself with laughter,
As though to shame my sorry thoughts
That fluttered after;

For though he couldn't perch so well,
Nor strut nor swagger any longer,
His wings were strong as any bird's-
Or were they stronger?

Window-Fire

There is a fire that fuses my spirit,

That kindles all the dry sticks of my mind

Into a breathing splendor.

It flames in the windows of old houses facing west,

Every clear day at sunset

Gone in a breath, a heart-beat,

As the blue dusk falls.

Song to the Beat of Wings

O Peace is a white bird,

And Beauty is a castled cloud,

And Love is a fierce fire that loves to be made kind;

And I have climbed the castled cloud,

And I have caged the fierce fire,

But the white bird, the white bird-her I cannot bind!

Alternatives

My years have limped; but I
Have tried so hard to fly!

And now, suppose Death brings

Gulls' wings

At last, for me to keep?

Yet comes he not so soon

But I know what a boon

Is-Sleep.

BY EDA LOU WALTON

For Mother on Her Birthday

Wild quince

And early grass,

Daffodils and crocus

And your birthdays pass,

And each spring brings a summer

Sweeter than before,

And each spring adds to your dear loveliness One wonder more.

I, Who Love Beauty

I, who love beauty, see you

Strong with wind-strength,

Perfect in outline as the star-tipped tree,

Through and through

'A symbol of nature's art completed;

A man who knowing

Of his beauty vaunts it gloriously

As water flowing

Vaults in leaping to white spray.

So I, who love beauty,

Love you.

She Who Was I

She who was I grew gold and white
Out of a night's dream woven,

Sprang full-shaped from the luminous light
Of desire for love and swift delight;

All silently, silently, silently
In the slipping hours of night
She who was I as I may not be
Was fashioned invisibly.

But night was pierced by the sword of day,
And she who was I has passed her way.

Warning

Do not take too seriously

These words I write;

Like birds in flight

Toward night,

They falter, go astray,
Cannot display

Their swiftness

Nor the white

Of inner-wings,

For darkness flings

A net across their way
And they entangled stray
Through bars of moonlight;
Do not take too seriously
These words I write.

LITERATURE

BY MAX SYLVIUS HANDMAN

I. The Social Background

It is needful to remember, in discussing the forces which have operated in the shaping of the Mexican literature of the last few decades, that the beginning of any discussion of literature, or rather the assumption underlying any such discussion, must be the recognition of the specific character of the literary man. It is in virtue of his special nervous organization, of his particular sensitiveness to the world within him and about him, that he is able to produce those works of imagination or interpretation which make him an artist. It is because the world is to him exceedingly painful or exceedingly joyful that he finds need for expression, an expression which culminates in that passionate outburst which sets him apart from the rest of mankind.

Yet a further observation must be made concerning the nature of the artist and his impulses. Particularly so when one attempts to present artistic productions in the light of the general social situation to which they are attached. This further observation concerns itself with the fact that the artist is forced, by the very nature of his being, to give expression to such things as he feels impelled to express. Whatever else he is in consequence, the first thing that the artist must be is honest in expressing the things which mean so much to him that it is simply impossible for him to exist without giving expression to them.

This much of the nature of the artist we must take for granted, take it for granted and leave it behind us in the further analysis of why in Mexico, for example, the types of literature that have arisen since 1850 present characteristics which can be understood only in the light of the social and economic life of Mexico since that time.

As an intellectual community, Mexico presents the limita