The Water Tank At Dusk

(In the Harqua Hala desert.)

The wild, bare, rock-fanged hills that all day long Shut in the hand-width valley from the world, Like wolfish out-posts which no foot might pass, Creep close as friendly dogs with head on paws And drowsy eyes that watch the evening fire. Their sun-baked, tawny brown melts into mist Of rose and violet and translucent blue, With gold dust powdered softly through the air That swims and shimmers as if all the earth Were carven jewels bathed in golden light. In the soft dusk the desert seems to pant, Only half-rested from the burning day; Yet stirs a little happily to feel The night wind, cool and gentle, whispering In the white-flowered mesquite where wild bees hum Delirious with honey sweets and fragrances; And through the leafless thorn whose tortured boughs Were wreathed, men say, to crown the suffering Christ On his high cross. (And still each Passion Week The sorrowing tree wears buds like drops of blood In memory.) With swift, soft whirr of wings The gray doves flutter down beside the pool, Cooing their love notes sweet as fairy flutes, And in the grass the fiddler-crickets chirp. The spotted night hawk saws his raucous note, Like some harsh rasp upon an o’er-drawn string; The squeaking bats drop from the cotton-wood trees, Dipping and diving round the shining pool Where night moths hover like moon-elves astray. It seems the deep blue sky has fallen there In the blue, star-set water, where the wind Makes mimic waves that hardly over-toss The peach-leaf boat on which the dragon fly Rides sailor-wise to rest his gorgeous wings. The hot, dry, day-time scent of sun-burned sand Is drowned in sweetness of the blossoming grape, And pungent odour of the wax-white cups Of yerba mansa, hedging the blue pool With a green wall whose every flower Blooms twice, once on its tall-leafed stalk, and once Down where the waves like silver mirrors mix Its whiteness with the red pomegranate stars. In the shadow of the plume-branched tamerask There is a half-hushed, honey-throated call, And from the cotton-wood’s topmost moonlit bough Music’s enraptured soul seems waked to answer. So sweet, so low, so pure, so tender-clear; So brimmed with joy; so wistful, plaintive-sad; As if all love o’ the world pulsed in that throat; As if all pain o’ life beat in the heart below. It is the mocking bird to his brown mate, The desert’s vesper song of rest and peace.