And other men as I that ploughed before
Shall watch thy harvest, trusting thou mayst reap
Where we have sown, and on your threshing floor
Have honest grain within thy barns to keep.
PATHS THAT WIND . . .
Paths that wind
O'er the hills and by the streams
I must leave behind—
Dawns and dews and dreams.
Trails that go
Through the woods and down the slopes
To the vale below;
Done with fears and hopes,
I must wander on
Till the purple twilight ends,
Where the sun has gone—
Faces, flowers and friends.
THE IMMORTAL GODS
The gods are there, they hide their lordly faces
From you that will not kneel—
Worship, and they reveal,
Call—and 'tis they!
They have not changed, nor moved from their high places,
The stars stream past their eyes like drifted spray;
Lovely to look on are they as bright gold,
They are wise with beauty, as a pool is wise.
Lonely with lilies; very sweet their eyes—
Bathed deep in sunshine are they, and very cold.
III
BALLADE OF WOMAN
A woman! lightly the mysterious word
Falls from our lips, lightly as though we knew
Its meaning, as we say—a flower, a bird,
Or say the moon, the stream, the light, the dew,
Simple familiar things, mysterious too;
Or as a star is set down on a chart,
Named with a name, out yonder in the blue:
A woman—and yet how much more thou art!
So lightly spoken, and so lightly heard,
And yet, strange word, who shall thy sense construe?
What sage hath yet fit designation dared?
Yet I have sought the dictionaries through,
And of thy meaning found me not a clue;
Blessing and breaking still the firmest heart,
So fairy false, yet so divinely true:
A woman—and yet how much more thou art!
Mother of God, and Circe, bosom-bared,
That nursed our manhood, and our manhood slew;
First dream, last sigh, all the long way we fared,
Sweeter than honey, bitterer than rue;
Thou fated radiance sorrowing men pursue,
Thou art the whole of life—the rest but part
Of thee, all things we ever dream or do;
A woman—and yet how much more thou art!