Blooms of the Berry. Madison Julius Cawein

PROEM.

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      Wine-warm winds that sigh and sing,

       Led me, wrapped in many moods,

       Thro' the green sonorous woods

       Of belated Spring;

      Till I came where, glad with heat,

       Waste and wild the fields were strewn,

       Olden as the olden moon,

       At my weary feet;

      Wild and white with starry bloom,

       One far milky-way that dashed,

       When some mad wind o'er it flashed,

       Into billowy foam.

      I, bewildered, gazed around,

       As one on whose heavy dreams

       Comes a sudden burst of beams,

       Like a mighty sound.

      If the grander flowers I sought,

       But these berry-blooms to you,

       Evanescent as their dew,

       Only these I brought.

      July 3, 1887.

I.—BY WOLD AND WOOD.

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THE HOLLOW.

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      I.

      Fleet swallows soared and darted

       'Neath empty vaults of blue;

       Thick leaves close clung or parted

       To let the sunlight through;

       Each wild rose, honey-hearted,

       Bowed full of living dew.

      II.

      Down deep, fair fields of Heaven,

       Beat wafts of air and balm,

       From southmost islands driven

       And continents of calm;

       Bland winds by which were given

       Hid hints of rustling palm.

      III.

      High birds soared high to hover;

       Thick leaves close clung to slip;

       Wild rose and snowy clover

       Were warm for winds to dip,