Between these colored colonnades of Thought
Down which I walk as to a music rare,
In breathless images of Beauty caught,
God's life and death I share.
Wild harmonies of Eastern pipe and flute
Mix in the measure of a Doric dance,
Where Poesy in pages Fancy-mute
Slumbers with lost Romance.
By airy memories of palm and beach
Adventure whistles to a wandering star,
Sailing the crystal labryinth of speech,
Dream-led to lands afar.
Here Fairy-Fiction weaves her wonder-loom
With rainbow threads of paragraph and phrase,
Mocking the troubled terraces of gloom
Where History's banners blaze.
In precious parchments, holy as Content,
Philosphies forgotten trembling lie.
I turn the leaves with olden creeds besprent
And hear a dead world sigh.
O'er painted palisades of cloth and board
Young fairies spill world-laughter loose and white,
'Mid azure letterings of crook and sword
Dimpling eternal Light.
O rich, warm scent of volumes newly-bound,
Closing immortal melodies and deeds,
Clean leaf and page with living words profound,
I follow where each leads.
Down through the murky avenues of Time
My soul goes singing in its search for Truth,
Where fragrant books in silences sublime
Breathe everlasting Youth.
Green fields of Poesy, high hills of Thought,
Plains, streams and palaces of Wisdom rare,
Within their miracle of Beauty caught,
God's life and death I share.
First published in The Bulletin, 24 June 1920
