The purple fields of even!

The vapor rises, silver-eyed,
Leaving the dew-wet clover,
With groping, mist-white hands outspread
To greet the sky, her lover.

Ripples the brook, a thread of sound
Close-woven through the quiet,
Blending the jarring tones that day
Would stir to noisy riot.

And all the glory seems so near
A common man may win it--
When every earth-bound lakelet holds
A million stars within it.

A common man, who in the day
Lifts not his eyes above him,
Roaming the fields of even through
May find a God to love him!

I Love My Love

I LOVE my love for she is like a garden in the dawn,
Pale, yet pink-flushed, with softly waking eyes,
And primrose hair that brightens to gold skies,
And petalled lips for dew to linger on.

I love my love for she is like the mirror of the moon,
(A sweet, small moon but newly come to birth)
So full of heaven is she, so close to earth,
So versed in holy spell and magic rune.

I love my love. O words that be too feeble and too few!
I love my love!--as April on the hill
Brings back earth's morning with each daffodil,
So she within my heart makes all things new.

Spring Awoke To-Day

SPRING awoke to-day!
Somewhere--far away--
Spring awoke to-day
From the depth of dream.

Through the air bestirred
Pulse of winging bird,
Through the air bestirred
Laugh of hidden stream.

On the world's cold lips
Fell warm finger-tips;
On the world's cold lips
Woke the glow and gleam!

Spring awoke to-day!
Somewhere--far away--
Spring awoke to-day
From the depth of dream!

In Town

SOMEWHERE there's a willow budding
In a hollow by the river,
Where the autumn leaves lie sodden,
Turning all the pool to brown;
There's a thrush who's building early,
With his feathers all a-shiver,
And the maple sap is rising--
But I'm glad that I'm in town.

Somewhere out there in the country
There's a brook that's overflowing,
And a quaker pussy-willow
Sews grey velvet on her gown;
Rushes whisper to each other
That marsh marigolds are showing,
And those saucy crocus fellows--
But I'm glad that I'm in town.

Long ago, when we were younger,
How those little things enthralled us;
King-birds nesting in the hedges,
Baby field-mice soft as down,
Muskrats in the sun-warmed shallows--
Strange how all these voices called us!--
Hark, was that a robin singing?
When's the next train out of town?

Summer's P