LAURA SPENCER PORTOR
Reading edition
Miss Laura Spencer Portor, poet and short-story writer, was born at Covington, Kentucky, in 1875. She lived at Covington until ten years old, when she was taken to Paris, France, where she attended private schools for two years. She returned to Kentucky, and attended school at Cincinnati, but she afterwards entered the old Norwood Institute, Washington. Her education being finished, Miss Portor again made her home at Covington, where she resided until a few years ago, when she went to New York, her home at the present time. She has worked in many literary fields. Children's work; essays; short-stories; feature and editorial work of all kinds; and verse for children and "grown-ups." Miss Portor is now children's editor of The Woman's Home Companion. She has been so very busy with her magazine work that she has found time to publish but one book, Theodora (Boston, 1907), a little tale for children, done in collaboration with Miss Katharine Pyle, sister of the famous American artist, the late Howard Pyle, and herself an artist and author of ability and reputation. The next few years will certainly see several of Miss Portor's manuscripts published in book form. Among her magazine stories and verse that have attracted attention may be mentioned her purely Kentucky tales, such as "A Gentleman of the Blue Grass," published in The Ladies' Home Journal; "The Judge," which appeared in The Woman's Home Companion; "Sally," a Southern story, printed in The Atlantic Monthly; and "My French School Days," an essay, also printed in The Atlantic, are thought to be the best things in prose Miss Portor has written so far. Her poems, "The Little Christ" (Atlantic Monthly), and "But One Leads South" (McClure's Magazine), are her most characteristic work in verse. She has written much for children in both prose and poetry. Miss Portor is one of Kentucky's proudest hopes in fiction or verse, and the books that are to be published from her pen will bring together her work in a manner that will be highly pleasing to her admirers.
Bibliography. Harper's Magazine (August, 1900); St. Nicholas Magazine (October, 1912).
THE LITTLE CHRIST[79]
[From The Atlantic Monthly, December, 1905]
Mother, I am thy little Son— Why weepest thou? Hush! for I see a crown of thorns, A bleeding brow. Mother, I am thy little Son— Why dost thou sigh? Hush! for the shadow of the years Stoopeth more nigh! Mother, I am thy little Son— Oh, smile on me. The birds sing blithe, the birds sing gay, The leaf laughs on the tree. Oh, hush thee! The leaves do shiver sore That tree whereon they grow, I see it hewn, and bound, to bear The weight of human woe! Mother, I am thy little Son— The Night comes on apace— When all God's waiting stars shall smile On me in thy embrace. Oh, hush thee! I see black starless night! Oh, could'st thou slip away Now, by the hawthorn hedge of Death,— And get to God by Day!
BUT ONE LEADS SOUTH[80]
[From McClure's Magazine, December, 1909]
So many countries of the earth, So many lands of such great worth; So stately, tall, and fair they shine,— So royal, all,—but one is mine. So many paths that come and go, Busy and freighted, to and fro; So many that I never see That still bring gifts and friends to me; So many paths that go and come, But one leads South,—and that leads home. Oh, I would rather see the face Of that dear land a little space Than have earth's richest, fairest things My own, or touch the hands of kings.— I'm homesick for it! When at night The silent road runs still and white,— Runs onward, southward, still and fair, And I know well it's going there, And I know well at last 'twill come To that old candle-lighted home,— Though all the candles of heaven are lit, I'm homesick for the sight of it!