With her wondering words and her looks she comes, In a sunbeam of a gown; She needs but think and the blossoms wink, But look, and they shower down. By orchard ways, where the wild-bee hums, With her wondering words and her looks she comes, Like a little maid to town. THE WIND OF SPRING The wind that breathes of columbines And bleeding-hearts that crowd the rocks; That shakes the balsam of the pines With music from his flashing locks, Stops at my city door and knocks. He calls me far a-forest; where The twin-leaf and the blood-root bloom; And, circled by the amber air, Life sits with beauty and perfume Weaving the new web of her loom. He calls me where the waters run Through fronding ferns where haunts the hern; And, sparkling in the equal sun, Song leans beside her brimming urn, And dreams the dreams that love shall learn. The wind has summoned, and I go,-- To con God's meaning in each line The flowers write, and, walking slow, God's purpose, of which song is sign,-- The wind's great, gusty hand in mine. INTERPRETED What magic shall solve us the secret Of beauty that's born for an hour? That gleams like the flight of an egret, Or burns like the scent of a flower, With death for a dower? What leaps in the bosk but a satyr? What pipes on the wind but a faun? Or laughs in the waters that scatter, But limbs of a nymph who is gone, When we walk in the dawn? What sings on the hills but a fairy? Or sighs in the fields but a sprite? What breathes through the leaves but the airy Soft spirits of shadow and light, When we walk in the night? Behold how the world-heart is eager To draw us and hold us and claim! Through truths of the dreams that beleaguer Her soul she makes ours the same, And death but a name. THE WILLOW BOTTOM Lush green the grass that grows between The willows of the bottom-land; Verged by the careless water, tall and green, The brown-topped cat-tails stand. The cows come gently here to browse, Slow through the great-leafed sycamores; You hear a dog bark from a low-roofed house With cedars round its doors. Then all is quiet as the wings Of the high buzzard floating there; Anon a woman's high-pitched voice that sings An old camp-meeting air. A flapping cock that crows; and then-- Heard drowsy through the rustling corn-- A flutter, and the cackling of a hen Within a hay-sweet barn. How still again! no water stirs; No wind is heard; although the weeds Are waved a little; and from silk-filled burrs Drift by a few soft seeds. So drugged with sleep and dreams, that you Expect to see her gliding by,-- Hummed round of bees, through blossoms spilling dew,-- The Spirit of July. THE OLD BARN Low, swallow-swept and gray, Between the orchard and the spring, All its wide windows overflowing hay, And crannied doors a-swing, The old barn stands to-day.