Ii

This is something that befell When my pipe was drawing well-- Something, rather, that I heard As the fluting of a bird.

Daphne, come and live with me In a Pagan greenery. Life will then be naught but play, One long Pagan holiday. We will play at hide and seek In the alders by the creek; Sport amid the cascade's smother. Splashing water at each other;-- Every moment pleasure wooing, Every moment something doing. If we talk, we'll talk of Love: All its arguments we'll prove. Such a mental rest you'll find. Leave your intellect behind.

Night will come, (for come it will, 'Spite the fluting on the hill,) And we'll pitch a cozy camp Where it isn't quite so damp. While you dry your hair and laze By the campfire's violet blaze, I will rob a balsam tree To construct a house for thee. What so dear as to be wooed In a sylvan solitude?

What so sweet as Pagan vows Whispered in a house of boughs? Pagan love's without alloy. Pagan kisses never cloy. Arms that cling in Pagan fashion Never tire. A Pagan passion Is the only kind I know That outlives a winter's snow. Daphne, Daphne, let us fly! You're a Pagan--so am I.

So the fluting on the hill Passed and died, and all was still. So the Pagan Pickings died, And I laid the pipe aside.