Iii

Along lone paths the cricket cries Sad summer nights that know the dew; One mad star thwart the heavens flies Curved glittering on the glassy blue; Now grows the big moon on the skies. The stars are faint and few.

Sweet night, breathe thou With a passion taken From a Romeo's vow; Sweet night, breathe thou Like a beauty shaken Of amorous dreams that have made her waken.

THE WOOD-PATH.

Here doth white Spring white violets show, Broadcast doth white, frail wind-flowers sow Through starry mosses amber-fair, As delicate as ferns that grow, Hart's-tongue and maiden-hair.

Here fungus life is beautiful, White mushroom and the thick toad-stool As various colored as wild blooms; Existences that love the cool, Distinct in rank perfumes.

Here stray the wandering cows to rest, The calling cat-bird builds her nest In spice-wood bushes dark and deep; Here raps the woodpecker his best, And here young rabbits leap.

Tall butternuts and hickories, The pawpaw and persimmon trees, The beech, the chestnut, and the oak, Wall shadows huge, like ghosts of bees Through which gold sun-bits soak.

Here to pale melancholy moons. In haunted nights of dreamy Junes, Wails wildly the weird whippoorwill, Whose mournful and demonic tunes Wild woods with phantoms fill.

DEFICIENCY.

Ah, God! were I away, away, By woodland-belted hills! There might be more in Thy bright day Than my poor spirit thrills.

The elder coppice, banks of blooms, The spice-wood brush, the field Of tumbled clover, and perfumes Hot, weedy pastures yield.

The old rail-fence whose angles hold Bright briar and sassafras, Sweet priceless wild flowers blue and gold Starred through the moss and grass.

The ragged path that winds unto Lone cow-behaunted nooks, Through brambles to the shade and dew Of rocks and woody brooks.

To see the minnows turn and gleam White sparkling bellies, all Shoot in gray schools adown the stream Let but a dead leaf fall.

The buoyant pleasure and delight Of floating feathered seeds. Capricious wanderers soft and white Born of silk-bearing weeds.

Ah, God! were I away, away, Among wild woods and birds! There were more soul within Thy day Than one might bless with words.

HE WHO LOVES.

For him God's birds each merry morn Make of wild throats melodious flutes To trill such love from brush and thorn As might brim eyes of brutes: Who would believe of such a thing, That 'tis her heart which makes them sing?

For him the faultless skies of noon Grow farther in eternal blue, As heavens that buoy the balanced moon, And sow the stars and dew: Who would believe that such deep skies Are miracles only through her eyes?

For him mad sylphs adown domed nights Stud golden globules radiant, Or glass-green transient trails of lights Spin from their orbs and slant: Who would believe a soul were hers To make for him a universe?

THE MONASTERY CROFT.

1

Big-stomached, like friars Who ogle a nun, Quaff deep to their bellies' desires From the old abbey's tun, Grapes fatten with fires Warm-filtered from moon and from sun.

2

As a novice who muses,-- Lips a rosary tell, While her thoughts are--a love she refuses? --Nay! mourns as not well: The ripe apple looses Its holding to rot where it fell.

THE DRYAD.

I have seen her limpid eyes Large with gradual laughter rise Through wild-roses' nettles, Like twin blossoms grow and stare, Then a hating, envious air Whisked them into petals.

I have seen her hardy cheek Like a molten coral leak Through the leafage shaded Of thick Chickasaws, and then, When I made more sure, again To a red plum faded.

I have found her racy lips, And her graceful finger-tips, But a haw and berry; Glimmers of her there and here, Just, forsooth, enough to cheer And to make me merry.

Often on the ferny rocks Dazzling rimples of loose locks At me she hath shaken, And I've followed--'twas in vain-- They had trickled into rain Sun-lit on the braken.

Once her full limbs flashed on me, Naked where some royal tree Powdered all the spaces With wan sunlight and quaint shade, Such a haunt romance hath made For haunched satyr-races.

There, I wot, hid amorous Pan, For a sudden pleading ran Through the maze of myrtle, Whiles a rapid violence tossed All its flowerage,--'twas the lost Cooings of a turtle.