THAT was the chirp of Ariel You heard, as overhead it flew, The farther going more to dwell, And wing our green to wed our blue; But whether note of joy or knell, Not his own Father-singer knew; Nor yet can any mortal tell, Save only how it shivers through; The breast of us a sounded shell, The blood of us a lighted dew. THE YOUTHFUL QUEST HIS Lady queen of woods to meet, He wanders day and night: The leaves have whisperings discreet, The mossy ways invite. Across a lustrous ring of space, By covert hoods and caves, Is promise of her secret face In film that onward waves. For darkness is the light astrain, Astrain for light the dark. A grey moth down a larches’ lane Unwinds a ghostly spark. Her lamp he sees, and young desire Is fed while cloaked she flies. She quivers shot of violet fire To ash at look of eyes. THE EMPTY PURSE A SERMON TO OUR LATER PRODIGAL SON THOU, run to the dry on this wayside bank, Too plainly of all the propellers bereft! Quenched youth, and is that thy purse? Even such limp slough as the snake has left Slack to the gale upon spikes of whin, For cast-off coat of a life gone blank, In its frame of a grin at the seeker, is thine; And thine to crave and to curse The sweet thing once within. Accuse him: some devil committed the theft, Which leaves of the portly a skin, No more; of the weighty a whine.