the night to the Argentine, Birds of azure and flame-birds go To the tropical Gulf of Mexico:   They chase the sun, they follow the heat, It is sweet in their bones, O sweet, sweet, sweet! It's not with them that I'd love to be, But under the roots of the balsam tree. 

   Just as the spiniest chestnut-burr Is lined within with the finest fur, So the stony-walled, snow-roofed house Of every squirrel and mole and mouse Is lined with thistledown, sea-gull's feather, Velvet mullein-leaf, heaped together With balsam and juniper, dry and curled, Sweeter than anything else in the world. O what a warm and darksome nest Where the wildest things are hidden to rest! It's there that I'd love to lie and sleep, Soft, soft, soft, and deep, deep, deep! 

    VILLAGE MYSTERY 

   The woman in the pointed hood And cloak blue-gray like a pigeon's wing, Whose orchard climbs to the balsam-wood, Has done a cruel thing. 

   To her back door-step came a ghost, A girl who had been ten years dead, She stood by the granite hitching-post And begged for a piece of bread. 

   Now why should I, who walk alone, Who am ironical and proud, Turn, when a woman casts a stone At a beggar in a shroud? 

   I saw the dead girl cringe and whine, And cower in the weeping air--   But, oh, she was no kin of mine, And so I did not care! 

    SUNSET ON THE SPIRE 

   All that I dream By day or night Lives in that stream Of lovely light. Here is the earth, And there is the spire; This is my hearth, And that is my fire. From the sun's dome I am shouted proof That this is my home, And that is my roof. Here is my food, And here is my drink, And I am wooed From the moon's brink. And the days go over, And the nights end; Here is my lover, Here is my friend. All that I Could ever ask Wears that sky Like a thin gold mask. 

    ESCAPE 

   When foxes eat the last gold grape, And the last white antelope is killed, I shall stop fighting and escape Into a little house I'll build. 

   But first I'll shrink to fairy size, With a whisper no one understands, Making blind moons of all your eyes, And muddy roads of all your hands. 

   And you may 

 Prev. P 8/13 next