Chapter I: GIVE you Life, O child, a garden fair;

I give you Love, a rose that blossoms there-- I give a day to pluck it and to wear!

I give you Death, O child--a boon more great-- That, when your Rose has withered and 'tis late, You may pass out and, smiling, close the gate!

The Town Between

A WALL impregnable surrounds
The Town wherein I dwell;
No man may scale it and it has
Two gates that guard it well.

One opened long ago, and I
A vagrant soul, slipped through,
Bewildered and forgetting all
The wider world I knew.

I love the Town, the narrow ways,
The common, yellow sun,
The handclasp and the jesting and
The work that must be done!

I shun the other gate that stands
Beyond the crowded mart--
I need but glance that way to feel
Cold fingers on my heart!

It stands alone and somberly
Within a shaded place,
And every man who turns that way
Has quiet on his face.

And every man must rise and leave
His pleasant homely door
To vanish through this silent gate
And enter in no more--

Yet--once--I saw its opening throw
A brighter light about
And glimpsed strange glory on the brow
Of someone passing out!

I wonder if Outside may be
One fair and great demesne
Where both gates open, careless of
The Town that lies between?

On the Mountain

THE top of the world and an empty morning,
Mist sweeping in from the dim Outside,
The door of day just a little bit open--
The wind's great laugh as he flings it wide!

O wind, here's one who would travel with you
To the far bourne you alone may know--
There would I seek what some one is hiding,
There would I find where my longings go!

To some deep calm would I drift and nestle Close to the heart of the Great Surprise. O strong wind, do you laugh to see us? We are so little and oh, so wise!

The Prophet

HE trod upon the heights; the rarer air Which common people seek, yet cannot bear, Fed his high soul and kindled in his eye The fire of one who cries "I prophesy!"

"Look up!" he said. They looked but could not see. "Help us!" they cried. He strove, but uselessly-- The very clouds which veiled the heaven they sought Hid from his eyes the hearts of them he taught!

Give Me a Day

GIVE me a day, beloved, that I may set A jewel in my heart--I'll brave regret, If, on the morrow, you shall say "forget"!

One golden day when dawn shall blush to noon And noon incline to dark, and, oversoon, My joy lie buried 'neath a rounded moon.

Only a day--it's worth you scarce could tell From other days; but in my life 'twill dwell An oasis with palm trees and a well!

Little Brown Bird

O LITTLE brown bird in the rain,
In the sweet rain of spring,
How you carry the youth of the world
In the bend of your wing!
For you the long day is for song
And the night is for sleep--
With never a sunrise too soon
Or a midnight too deep!

For you every pool is the sky,
Breaking clouds chasing through,--
A heaven so instant and near
That you bathe in its blue!--
And yours is the freedom to rise
To some song-haunted star
Or sink on soft wing to the wood
Where your brown nestlings are.

So busy, so strong and so glad,
So care-free and young,
So tingling with life to be lived
And with songs to be sung,
O little brown bird!--with your heart
That's the heart of the Spring--
How you carry the hope of the world
In the bend of your wing!

The Watcher

THE long road and the low shore, a sail against the sky, The ache in my heart's core, and hope so hard to die-- Ah me, but the day's long--and all the sails go by!

The long road and the dark shore, pools with stars aflame, The ache in my heart's core, the hope I dare not name-- Ah, me, but the night's long--and every night the same!

Possession

A YOUTH sat down on a wayside stone,
A pack on his back and a staff at his knee.
He whistled a tune which he called his own,
"It's a fine new tune, that tune!" said he.

In his pack he carried a crust of bread,
And he drank from his hands at a brook hard by;
"Spring water is wonderful cool," he said,
"And wonderful soft is the summer sky!"

He looked to the hill which his steps had passed,
He looked to the slope where a brooklet purled,
He looked to the distance blue and vast
And "Ah," cried he, "what a fine, wide world!"

The youth passed on down the winding track
That led to the beckoning distance dim,
And though he carried but staff and pack,
The world and its giving belonged to him.

To Arcady

"TELL me, Singer, of the way Winding down to Arcady? Of the world's roads I am weary-- You, with song so brave and cheery, Happy troubadour must be On the way to Arcady?"

Pausing on a muted note, Song forsook the Singer's throat, "Friend," sighed he, "you come too late, Once I could the way relate, Once--but long ago; Ah me, Far away is Arcady!"

"Tell me, Poet, of the way Winding down to Arcady? Haunting is your verse and airy With the grace and gleam of faery-- Dweller you must surely be In the land of Arcady?"

Slow the Poet raised his eyes, Sad were they as winter skies, "Once, I sojourned there," he said; Then, no more--but with bent head Whispered low, "Ask not of me That lost road to Arcady!"

Tell me, Lover, of the way Winding down to Arcady? Some sweet bourne your haste confesses-- Know you paths no other guesses? Does your gaze, so far away, See the road to Arcady?

In the Lover's eyes there gleamed Radiance of all things dreamed-- "Nay, detain me not," he cried "I am hasting to my bride; What have roads to do with me, Love's at home in Arcady!"

The Fields of Even

O STILLER than the fields that lie
Beneath the morning heaven,
And sweeter than day's gardens are
The purple fields of even!

The vapor rises, silver-eyed,
Leaving the dew-wet clover,
With groping, mist-white hands outspread
To greet the sky, her lover.

Ripples the brook, a thread of sound
Close-woven through the quiet,
Blending the jarring tones that day
Would stir to noisy riot.

And all the glory seems so near
A common man may win it--
When every earth-bound lakelet holds
A million stars within it.

A common man, who in the day
Lifts not his eyes above him,
Roaming the fields of even through
May find a God to love him!

I Love My Love