He leaves the temples where the merchants trade,
Leaves bright bazaar and marble collanade,
And hand and hand with the white moon he strays
Away to leafy lanes and country ways.
He vizualizes green of plashy mead
Of kneedeep grass, where lowing cattle feed,
Of orchard slope, scalloped with rosy bloom
And purple lilacs bursting into plume.
Electric beads may dot the cities plain,
But in his heart old candles flare again;
Old doors stand open, and beside old stiles
He leans, and listens as in other whiles.
So dreams; so wanders back to youth and home,
To swelling farms, to rich hill-breasted loam;
So hand in hand with the young moon he strays
Out of the city gates to the old days.
THE INTERPRETER
LAST night I heard Masefield,
Heard that voice cold as a moonlit tomb
Reading old plays and masques
And gipsy drama of old England.
I saw strange eyes flickering—sad,
Set in a face recording vigils,
Moody, unfellowed prowlings
Vague contemplations and wanderings.
I saw his face, dream-magnetic,
Pale, withheld, until he told
Stories as odd as coins in a sailor’s chest;
Then mischief, like leaves danced on his brow,
And a smile like water shook on his face.
I heard the grind of creaking anchor chains
Felt ropes bruise, and felt the capstan pull,
Saw driven slanting masts, and saw the hoops
Slink as some halliard parted, and was caught.
I heard dead seamen’s lips
Recounting heaps of gold in sunken ships;
I saw the dumb eyes of pathetic women,
Horribly treated by wine-frenzied brutes.