Out where the sirens laugh, And winds make faces at the moon, When cloud-wrack, glooming from the East, Comes swaying on the blast, And tides are babbling long-forgotten lore, While dead men’s cups brim high, And clash and spill about the keel; ’Tis then you blaze a road of fire For frail and puny folk who fear the dark, And sweep the dreams from blinded eyes, That so the ships that chariot the deep May learn of safety where the green bill preens her feathers, thin and light, To breast the gale, And wonders at the clumsy, strange device of man. WHITE GULLS. We are the butterflies of the sea, White butterflies, Shining in the sun, Dipping the sun, For we are made of light, Our bones are hollow as a straw. We pluck the rain from clouds, And so, are always crying; But we are butterflies, White butterflies, Children of our old mother-- The sea. TO THE RED MAN. No pastoral ditty, withering with time, should consecrate your unremembered dust, No sickly taper as a monolith should burn, and flicker out, Had I the mystic power to chant a deathless rigadoon With this elusive pan; ’Tis not for me. But I would plant a live-oak by your wigwam door, So safely closed, Whose grandsire knew your clan; I’d woo the goshawk come and build among its knotty boughs, and year by year, And nevermore should pale-face desecrate your name, that evermore should rustle in the leaves; By light of every harvest moon, the noble footed deer should follow up the trail to that sequestered spot, And kneel in reverence; The fires of happy hunting grounds should streak and flush the northern sky on every ice-hung night, To soothe your dreams, and keep you warm; Yea, more, above your bleaching bones, the revelry of nomad-winds along the gullying wave, you loved so well, Should be an after-song of unsung yesterdays, more peaceful than the heart of river-reeds. TO MASSASOIT. CHIEF SACHEM OF THE WAMPANOAGS. The vaulted skies your rosary, The wilderness your shrine, The lifting sea your ritual, Would I might make them mine, O brother Pagan! Here’s my hand, Would, ’mid the Sisters Seven, Of yellow hair, in yonder air, I were as sure of Heaven As you--who know the trail of Death, The sorrow of the bird, The whither, whence, a white-moth flies, The wood-brook’s laughing word. THE WINNETUXET. I’ve rowed the Juniata, I’ve trailed the Kennebec, I’ve drifted down Algerian shores Stretched on the upper deck. I’ve seen the Golden Gate swing wide To let the sunset through On wings of flowing opal, With tangerine and blue. I’ve idled down the Congo And dallied up the tide That girdles the Bahamas, I’ve floated down the Clyde, But let me hear the music, And smell the briar rose, Of summer’s listless noontide where The Winnetuxet flows. Singlehurst, Plympton, Mass. HYMN ANCESTRAL.