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A Maine Trail

1633

A MAINE TRAIL

COME follow, heart upon your sleeve,
The trail, a-teasing by,

Past tasseled corn and fresh-mown hay,
Trim barns and farm-house shy,
Past hollyhocks and white well-sweep,
Through pastures bare and wild,

Oh come, let's fare to the heart-o'-the-wood
With the faith of a little child.

Strike in by the gnarled way through the swamp

Where late the laurel shone,

An intimate close where you meet yourself

And come unto your own,

By bouldered brook to the hidden spring
Where breath of ferns blows sweet

And swift birds break the silence as
Their shadows cross your feet.

Stout-hearted thrust through gold-green copse

To garner the woodland glee,

To weave a garment of warm delight,

Of sunspun ecstasy;

'Twill shield you all winter from frosty eyes,

"Twill shield your heart from cold;

Such greens!-how the Lord Himself loves green!
Such sun!-how He loves the gold!

Then on till flaming fireweed

Is quenched in forest deep;

Tread soft! The sumptuous paven moss
Is spread for Dryads' sleep;
And list ten thousand thousand spruce
Lift up their voice to God-
We can a little understand,
Born of the self-same sod.

Oh come, the welcoming trees lead on,
Their guests are we to-day;

Shy violets smile, proud branches bow,
Gay mushrooms mark the way;

The silence is a courtesy,

The well-bred calm of kings;
Come haste! the hour sets its face
Unto great Happenings.

Gertrude Huntington McGiffert [18

AFOOT

COMES the lure of green things growing,
Comes the call of waters flowing—
And the wayfarer desire

Moves and wakes and would be going.

Hark the migrant hosts of June
Marching nearer noon by noon!
Hark the gossip of the grasses
Bivouacked beneath the moon!

Long the quest and far the ending
When my wayfarer is wending—
When desire is once afoot,
Doom behind and dream attending!

In his ears the phantom chime

Of incommunicable rhyme,

He shall chase the fleeting camp-fires

Of the Bedouins of Time.

Farer by uncharted ways,

Dumb as death to plaint or praise,

Unreturning he shall journey,

Fellow to the nights and days;

Till upon the outer bar

Stilled the moaning currents are,

Till the flame achieves the zenith,

Till the moth attains the star,

Till through laughter and through tears

Fair the final peace appears,

And about the watered pastures

Sink to sleep the nomad years!

Charles G. D. Roberts [1860

1635

From Romany to Rome

FROM ROMANY TO ROME

UPON the road to Romany

It's stay, friend, stay!

There's lots o' love and lots o' time

To linger on the way; Poppies for the twilight, Roses for the noon,

It's happy goes as lucky goes

To Romany in June.

But on the road to Rome-oh,
It's march, man, march!

The dust is on the chariot wheels,

The sere is on the larch,

Helmets and javelins

And bridles flecked with foam

The flowers are dead, the world's ahead
Upon the road to Rome.

But on the road to Rome-ah,
It's fight, man, fight!
Footman and horseman

Treading left and right,
Camp-fires and watch-fires

Ruddying the gloam

The fields are gray and worn away
Along the road to Rome.

Upon the road to Romany

It's sing, boys, sing!

Though rag and pack be on our back
We'll whistle to the King.

Wine is in the sunshine,

Madness in the moon,

And de'il may care the road we fare

To Romany in June.

Along the road to Rome, alas!

The glorious dust is whirled, Strong hearts are fierce to see The City of the World;

Yet footfall or bugle-call
Or thunder as ye will,

Upon the road to Romany

The birds are calling still!

Wallace Irwin [1875–

THE TOIL OF THE TRAIL

WHAT have I gained by the toil of the trail?
I know and know well.

I have found once again the lore I had lost
In the loud city's hell.

I have broadened my hand to the cinch and the axe, I have laid my flesh to the rain;

I was hunter and trailer and guide;

I have touched the most primitive wildness again.

I have threaded the wild with the stealth of the deer,

No eagle is freer than I;

No mountain can thwart me, no torrent appall,
I defy the stern sky.

So long as I live these joys will remain,

I have touched the most primitive wildness again.

Hamlin Garland [1860

DO YOU FEAR THE WIND?

Do you fear the force of the wind,

The slash of the rain?

Go face them and fight them,

Be savage again.

Go hungry and cold like the wolf,

Go wade like the crane:

The palms of your hands will thicken,

The skin of your cheek will tan,

You'll grow ragged and weary and swarthy,

But you'll walk like a man!

Hamlin Garland [1860

The King's Highway

1637

THE KING'S HIGHWAY

"El Camino Real"

ALL in the golden weather, forth let us ride to-day,
You and I together, on the King's Highway,

The blue skies above us, and below the shining sea;
There's many a road to travel, but it's this road for me.

It's a long road and sunny, and the fairest in the world— There are peaks that rise above it in their snowy mantles curled,

And it leads from the mountains through a hedge of chap

arral,

Down to the waters where the sea gulls call.

It's a long road and sunny, it's a long road and old,
And the brown padres made it for the flocks of the fold;
They made it for the sandals of the sinner-folk that trod
From the fields in the open to the shelter-house of God.

They made it for the sandals of the sinner-folk of old;
Now the flocks they are scattered and death keeps the fold;
But you and I together we will take the road to-day,
With the breath in our nostrils, on the King's Highway.

We will take the road together through the morning's golden glow,

And we'll dream of those who trod it in the mellowed long

ago;

We will stop at the Missions where the sleeping padres lay, And we'll bend a knee above them for their souls' sake to

pray.

We'll ride through the valleys where the blossom's on the

tree,

Through the orchards and the meadows with the bird and

the bee,

And we'll take the rising hills where the manzanitas grow,
Past the gray tails of waterfalls where blue violets blow.

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