 | The poems of Madison Cawein |  |
41
THE DEAD OREAD
Her heart is still and leaps no more
With holy passion when the breeze,
Her whilom playmate, as before,
Comes with the language of the bees,
Sad songs her mountain cedars sing,
And water-music murmuring.
With holy passion when the breeze,
Her whilom playmate, as before,
Comes with the language of the bees,
Sad songs her mountain cedars sing,
And water-music murmuring.
Her calm, white feet,—once fleet and fast
As Daphne's when a god pursued,—
No more will dance like sunlight past
The gold-green vistas of the wood,
Where every quailing floweret
Smiled into life where they were set.
As Daphne's when a god pursued,—
No more will dance like sunlight past
The gold-green vistas of the wood,
Where every quailing floweret
Smiled into life where they were set.
Hers were the limbs of living light,
And breasts of snow, as virginal
As mountain drifts; and throat as white
As foam of mountain waterfall;
And hyacinthine curls, that streamed
Like mountain mists, and gloomed and gleamed.
And breasts of snow, as virginal
As mountain drifts; and throat as white
As foam of mountain waterfall;
And hyacinthine curls, that streamed
Like mountain mists, and gloomed and gleamed.
42
Her presence breathed such scents as haunt
Deep mountain dells and solitudes,
Aromas wild,—like some wild plant
That fills with sweetness all the woods;—
And comradeship with stars and skies
Shone in the azure of her eyes.
Deep mountain dells and solitudes,
Aromas wild,—like some wild plant
That fills with sweetness all the woods;—
And comradeship with stars and skies
Shone in the azure of her eyes.
Her grave be by a mossy rock
Upon the top of some high hill,
Removed, remote from men who mock
The myths, the dreams of life they kill;
Where all of love and naught of lust
May guard her solitary dust.
Upon the top of some high hill,
Removed, remote from men who mock
The myths, the dreams of life they kill;
Where all of love and naught of lust
May guard her solitary dust.
| The poems of Madison Cawein | |