Wind and shadow, cloud and bird, Spoke each to my heart a musical word. The little brown cone that fell on my cheek, The squirrel who mocked with an impudent squeak, The golden mushroom brimmed with death, The twin-flower blessing the air with its breath; Old spider spinning above my head A magical dream with her rainbow thread; The liliput vases of moss below; The sudden caw of a picket crow; The rhythmical green of a supple snake Quivering into a lair of brake; The grumbling bee, the whispering pine— What need had they for a word of mine? They lived the poem; they wove the spell No tongue could utter, no phrases tell; And a human voice could but disgrace The eloquent stillness of the place. So I lay at the foot of the ancient tree, And let God’s free verse sing to me. CIPHERS Oh, to be a wonder-child And read the cipher of the wild! A starry-splintered alphabet In the ancient rocks is set, Spelling, if one held the key, All creation’s history. Cryptic messages I trace Etched on many a flower-face; Graven symbols score the pines, The birches wear mysterious signs— Perhaps the wistful diary Of the Dryad in her tree. On the open page of snow Curious hieroglyphics show, Dots and dashes, twist and thrust, Carven in the crystal crust; Marks of furred and feathered things With furtive feet or startled wings— Comic secrets of the dark, Silent tragedy and stark. Ciphers, ciphers everywhere, In the sky, the wave, the air! On the faces that one meets Adrift upon the eddying streets; On the near and dear, that change With lines inscrutable and strange— Palimpsests that time has wrought With the signs of hidden thought, Dreams unguessed and griefs unsaid, Passionate yearning unbetrayed. Ah, could Love but find and own Nature’s old Rosetta Stone! PINE MUSIC A hundred years I seek the stars Through tempest, heat, and cold; My body scarred by many scars, My spirit wisely old.