On either side the wooded slopes come down, Hemlock and beech and chestnut; here and there Through the deep forest laurel spreads and gleams, Pink-white as Daphne in her loveliness-- That still perfection from the world withdrawn, As if the wood gods had arrested there Immortal beauty in her breathless flight. Far overhead against the arching blue Gray ledges overhang from dizzy heights, Scarred by a thousand winters and untamed. The road winds in from the broad riverlands, Luring the happy traveler turn by turn, Up to the lofty mountains of the sky. And where the road runs in the valley’s foot, Through the dark woods the mountain stream comes down, Singing and dancing all its youth away Among the boulders and the shallow runs, Where sunbeams pierce and mossy tree trunks hang, Drenched all day long with murmuring sound and spray. There, light of heart and footfree, I would go Up to my home among the lasting hills, And in my cabin doorway sit me down, Companioned in that leafy solitude By the wood ghosts of twilight and of peace. And in that sweet seclusion I should hear, Among the cool-leafed beeches in the dusk, The calm-voiced thrushes at their evening hymn-- So undistraught, so rapturous, so pure, It well might be, in wisdom and in joy, The seraphs singing at the birth of time The unworn ritual of eternal things. _Smart Set_ _Bliss Carman_ PERUGIA For the sake of a weathered gray city set high on a hill To the northward I go, Where Umbria’s valley lies mile upon emerald mile Outspread like a chart. The wind in her steep, narrow streets is eternally chill From the neighboring snow, But linger who will in the lure of a southerly smile, Here is my heart. Wrought to a mutual blueness are mountains and sky, Intermingling they meet; Little gray breathings of olive arise from the plain Like sighs that are seen, For man and his Maker harmonious toil, and the sigh Of such labor is sweet, And the fruits of their patience are vistas of vineyards and grain In a glory of green. No wind from the valley that passes the casement but flings Invisible flowers. The carol of birds is a gossamer tissue of gold On a background of bells. Sweetest of all, in the silence the nightingale sings Through the silver-pure hours, Till the stars disappear like a dream that may never be told, Which the dawning dispels. Never so darkling the alley but opens at last On unlimited space; Each gate is the frame of a vision that stretches away To the rims of the sky. Never a scar that was left by the pitiless past But has taken a grace, Like the mark of a smile that was turned upon children at play In a summer gone by.