ose-red islands,
Painting the sand's wet gold,

Down to their dreams of the sunset,
Frail as a flower's white ghost,
Lonely and lost she wandered
Down to the darkening coast;
Lost in the drifting midnight,
Weeping, desolate, blind.
Many went out to seek her:
Never a heart could find.

Yoichi Tenko, the painter,
Plucked from his willow-tree
Two big paper lanterns
And ran to the brink of the sea;
Over his head he held them,
Crying, and only heard,
Somewhere, out in the darkness,
The cry of a wandering bird.

VI

Peonies, peonies thronged the May
When in royal-rich array
Came Sawara to the school
Under the silvery willow-tree--
To the school of Tenko!
Silver bells on a milk-white mule,
Rose-red sails on an emerald sea!
Over the bloom of the cherry spray,
Peonies, peonies dimmed the day;
And he rode the royal way
Back to Yoichi Tenko.

Yoichi Tenko, half afraid,
Whispered, "Wed some other maid;
Kimi left me all alone
Under the silvery willow-tree,
Left me," whispered Tenko,
"Kimi had a heart of stone!"--
"Kimi, Kimi? Who is she?
Kimi? Ah--the child that played
Round the willow-tree. She prayed
Often; and, whate'er I said,
She believed it, Tenko."

He had come to paint anew
Those dim isles of rose and blue,
For a palace far away,
Under the silvery willow-tree--
So he said to Tenko;
And he painted, day by day,
Golden visions of the sea.
No, he had not come to woo;
Yet, had Kimi proven true,
Doubtless he had loved her too,
Hardly less than Tenko.

Since the thought was in his head,
He would make his choice and wed;
And a lovely maid he chose
Under the silvery willow-tree.
"Fairer far," said Tenko.
"Kimi had a twisted nose,
And a foot too small, for me,
And her face was dull as lead!"
"Nay, a flower, be it white or red,
_Is_ a flower," Sawara said!
"So it is," said Tenko.

VII

Great Sawara, the painter,
Sought, on a day of days,
One of the peacock islands
Out in the sunset haze:
Rose-red sails on the water
Carried him quickly nigh;
There would he paint him a wonder
Worthy of Hokusai.

Lo, as he leapt o'er the creaming
Roses of faery