Vii

“And in my soul I see how, soon, shall rise,-- Still hidden to men’s eyes,-- Dim as the wind that round them treads,-- Hosts of spring-beauties, streaked with rosy reds, And pale anemones, whose airy heads, As to some fairy rhyme, All day shall nod in delicate time: And now, even now, white peal on peal Of pearly bells,--that in bare boughs conceal Themselves,--like snowy music, chime on chime, The huckleberries to my gaze reveal-- Clusters, that soon shall toss Above this green-starred moss, That, like an emerald fire, gleams across This forest-side, and from its moist deeps lifts Slim, wire-like stems of seed; Or, lichen-colored, glows with many a bead Of cup-like blossoms: carpets where, I read, When through the night’s dark rifts The moonlight’s glimpsing splendor sifts, The immaterial forms With moonbeam-beckoning arms, Of Fable and Romance,-- Myths that are born of whispers of the wind And foam of falling waters, music-twinned-- Shall lead the legendary dance; The dance that never stops, Of Earth’s wild beauty on the green hill-tops.”