THE OLD BUSH PASTURE.
Give me the old bush-path again
Which wandered past my Uncle Tim’s,
The dusky dells, the musky smells,
That filtered through the sunset glims;
The goblins crouching ’neath the trees,
The bats and witches by the mill,
The foolish talk of all the leaves;
And let me hear the whip-poor-will
Above the pines, the old new moon
Hung high and dry, up there alone,
And golden-clear and far and near,
A-chanting in an undertone
Of something half a-kin to fear,
Which only whip-poor-wills can hear.
Give me the old bush-path again,
The barefoot days, the old-time ways,
The old-time ties, the dragon-flies,
And childish joys unfit for men.
Plympton, Mass.,
September 17, 1920.