You who loved all lovely things
And wrought in jewelled lines;
You have gone your gracious ways
That are patterned in dim stones
Of perfumed, faint-hued words;
You were a thing so feminine
That even of war you sang in tender notes,
But now another one has come,
Who is herself at war.
Her songs are keen and glittering,
For she has felt the magic fire
That you did long ago;
But now the fire has burned clean through
And forged a sword of steel.
Swinging swords are women's songs
That gleam as hard as diamonds do,
And mean to cut tradition.
And yet those jewelled lines!
Strangely the ancient magic works,
Strangely the same fire lurks
And burns imprisoned there
In your dim, opaled words,
That run like paths in heaven
Paved in mosaic of sweet stones,
And make a scented highway for our feet,
Who wield these swinging swords.
GOING NORTH
GOING NORTH
I
White Porches
Just as we left the avenue
I saw a golden butterfly
Flutter against the windshield.
I felt the motor take the breeze,
As gaily as a yacht might do
Upon some tidal river of the seas.
We sailed a broad grey asphalt
Out past the red brick houses,
And fringy, ragged outskirts
To where the fields begin.
And Pickering, Whitby, Oshawa,
Flashed by like friendly postscripts
Of the Town's lengthy scroll,
With dusty little detours,
And cobblestone communities
To break the highway's hundred miles
Of river-like content.
We smiled at sleepy Main Streets,
And joyous village gardens,
And sprawling crimson orchards,
Heavy with ripened fruit.
Each mile or two a butterfly
Danced near the blazing windshield,
"The same gold butterfly!" we said,
"And the same village street!"
We passed a hundred porches,
Ancient and modern porches,
And some of them were white ones,
And those we loved the best.
Many a bed of phlox we passed,
Lilac and pink and white,
And they were gardens of delight
Along our asphalt river-front—
Sheer gardens of delight.
We loved all purple calicoes
On cheerful, ambling ladies,
Their morning work already done,
Sauntering through a mile of sun
Up to the general store.
Sometimes they sat on porches,
Narrow but shining porches,
Serenely shelling peas.
"Just what is life," we wondered,
"For those who sit contented
Throughout the magic summer
On these pale country porches,
Patching—knitting—talking—
Serenely shelling peas?"