Make me as one who sows solitude, and may he who hears my speech
Return home troubled and heavy.
1895-1900
THE EAST I KNOW
THE COCOA PALM
Our trees stand upright like men, but motionless; thrusting their roots deep in earth, they flourish with outstretched arms. But here the sacred banyan does not rise as a single stem; for the pendent threads, through which it returns seeking the fruitful soil, make it seem a marvelous temple self-created.
Observe only the cocoa palm. It has no branches. At the apex of the trunk it raises a tuft of fronds.
Palm! The insignia of triumph. Aerial in the light, consummate bloom of the crest, it soars, expands, rejoices,—and sinks beneath the weight of its freedom.
Through the warm day and the long noon the cocoa palm expands. In an ecstasy it spreads its happy leaves. Like infant heads the cocoanuts appear, the great green fruit of the tree.