"My tall and tawny king, come back!
Come swift, O sweet; why falter so?
Come! Come! What thing has crossed your track
I kneel to all the gods I know.
O come, my manly Idaho!
Great Spirit, what is this I dread?
Why there is blood! the wave is red!
That wrinkled Chief, outstripped in race,
Dives down, and hiding from my face,
Strikes underneath!… He rises now!
Now plucks my hero's berry bough,
And lifts aloft his red fox head,
And signals he has won for me….
Hist softly! Let him come and see.
"O come! my white-crowned hero, come!
O come! and I will be your bride,
Despite yon chieftain's craft and might.
Come back to me! my lips are dumb,
My hands are helpless with despair;
The hair you kissed, my long, strong hair,
Is reaching to the ruddy tide,
That you may clutch it when you come.
"How slow he buffets back the wave!
O God, he sinks! O heaven! save
My brave, brave boy. He rises! See!
Hold fast, my boy! Strike! strike for me.
Strike straight this way! Strike firm and strong!
Hold fast your strength. It is not long—
O God, he sinks! He sinks! Is gone!
His face has perished from my sight.
"And did I dream, and do I wake?
Or did I wake and now but dream?
And what is this crawls from the stream?
O here is some mad, mad, mistake!
What you! The red fox at my feet?
You first and failing from a race?
What! you have brought me berries red?
What! You have brought your bride a wreath?
You sly red fox with wrinkled face—
That blade has blood, between your teeth!
"Lie still! lie still! till I lean o'er
And clutch your red blade to the shore….
Ha! Ha! Take that! and that! and that!
Ha! Ha! So through your coward throat
The full day shines!… Two fox tails float
And drift and drive adown the stream.
"But what is this? What snowy crest
Climbs out the willows of the west,
All weary, wounded, bent, and slow,
And dripping from his streaming hair?
It is! it is my Idaho!
His feet are on the land, and fair
His face is lifting to my face,
For who shall now dispute the race?
"The gray hawks pass, O love! two doves
O'er yonder lodge shall coo their loves.
My love shall heal your wounded breast,
And in yon tall lodge two shall rest."
Joaquin Miller.
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