March 8

'TIS from those moods in which Life stands With feet earth-planted, yet with hands

Stretched toward visionary lands,

Where vapours lift

A moment, and aerial strands

Gleam through the rift,

The poet wins, in hours benign,

At older than the Delphic shrine,

Those intimations faint and fine

To which belongs

Whatever character divine

Invests his songs.

And could we live more near allied

To cloud and mountain, wind and tide,

Cast this unmeaning coil aside,

And go forth free,

The World our goal, Desire our guide,—

We then might see

Those master moments grow less rare,

And oftener feel that nameless air

Come rumouring from we know not where;

And touch at whiles

Fantastic shores, the fringes fair

Of fairy isles,

And hail the mystic bird that brings

News from the inner courts of things,

The eternal courier-dove whose wings

Are never furled;

And hear the bubbling of the springs

That feed the world.

WILLIAM

WATSON

THE WAYS OF DEATH