THE SPECKLED TROUT
With rod and line I took my way
That led me through the gossip trees,
Where all the forest was asway
With hurry of the running breeze.
I took my hat off to a flower
That nodded welcome as I passed;
And, pelted by a morning shower,
Unto its heart a bee held fast.
A head of gold one great weed tossed,
And leaned to look when I went by;
And where the brook the roadway crossed
The daisy kept on me its eye.
And when I stooped to bathe my face,
And seat me at a great tree’s foot,
I heard the stream say, “Mark the place:
And undermine it rock and root.”
And o’er the whirling water there
A dragonfly its shuttle plied,
Where wild a fern let down its hair,
And leaned to see the water’s pride—
A speckled trout. The spotted elf,
Whom I had come so far to see,
Stretched out above a rocky shelf,
A shadow sleeping mockingly.
* * * * *
And I have sat here half the day
Regarding it. It has not stirred.
I heard the running water say—
“He does not know the magic word.
“The word that changes everything,
And brings all Nature to his hand:
That makes of this great trout a king,
And opes the way to Faeryland.”
The Bellman Madison Cawein