8:30 A. M. ON 32ND STREET

The wind sniffed like a happy cat

At scuttling beetle-people,

The sunshine would have roused a flat

To try and be a steeple.

My breakfast in me warm and staunch,

Your letter in my pocket,

The world’s a coon that’s climbed a branch

And I am David Crockett.

Time hoards our lives with griping care

And barren is his bursary,

But he’ll make diamonds of the air

Upon one anniversary!

Five years ago I saw you first

And knew in every part

The flagrant and immortal thirst

Love salts into the heart.

Five years ago the Pleiad crew

Sang in their starry hive,

Because a miracle like you

Could dare to be alive!

Five years, and still, through earth’s degrees

You, like a pageant, pass;

Courageous as invading seas

And careless as the grass.

Pauper poets of rimes grown thin

Mutter their madhouse wrongs.

I have aeons to love you in,

Ages to make you songs!

Pour your rain on the bitter tree!

Harrow the soil with spears!

I shall grow you Felicity,

After a million years!

The street-signs winked like smiles at me,

The wind pawed by enchanted!

The sun swung high for all to see

I’d stop him if I wanted!