"That's for me to judge. Let me hear something of that kind. If you only knew how terribly much you interest me!" "You mean that?" "Of course I do! Please let me hear something you've written!" He pondered a moment, then in his well-modulated, deep-toned voice began: _HESPERIDES_. I. My feet, used to pine-needles, moss and turf, And the gray boulders at the lip o' the sea, Where the cold brine jets up its creamy surf, Now tread once more these city ways, unloved by me, Hateful and hot, gross with iniquity. And so I grieve, Grieve when I wake, or at high blinding noon Or when the moon Mocks this sad Ninevah where the throngs weave Their jostling ways by day, their paths by night; Where darkness is not--where the streets burn bright With hectic fevers, eloquent of death! I gasp for breath.... Visions have I, visions! So sweet they seem That from this welter of men and things I turn, to dream Of the dim Wood-world, calling out to me. Where forest-virgins I half glimpse, half see With cool mysterious fingers beckoning! Where vine-wreathed woodland altars sunlit burn, Or Dryads dance their mystic rounds and sing, Sing high, sing low, with magic cadences That once the wild oaks of Dodona heard; And every wood-note bids me burst asunder The bonds that hold me from the leaf-hid bird. I quaff thee, O Nepenthe! Ah, the wonder Grows, that there be who buy their wealth, their ease By damning serfs to cities, hot and blurred, Far from thy golden quest, Hesperides!... II. I see this August sun again Sheer up high heaven wheel his angry way; And hordes of men Bleared with unrestful sleep rise up another day, Their bodies racked with aftermaths of toil. Over the city, in each gasping street, Shudders a haze of heat, Reverberant from pillar, span and plinth. Once more, cribbed in this monstrous labyrinth Sacrificed to the Minotaur of Greed Men bear the turmoil, glare, sweat, brute inharmonies; Denial of each simplest human need, Loss of life's meaning as day lags on day; And my rebellious spirit rises, flies In dreams to the green quiet wood away, Away! Away! III.