 THE COVERED BRIDGE, by Madison Cowine, read from LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. There from its entrance, lost in matted vines, where in the valley foams a waterfall, is glimpsed a ruined mill's remaining wall. Here by the road the black-eyed Susan mines hot brass and bronze, the trumpet-trailer shines red as the plumage of the cardinal. Right from the forest comes the rain-crows-call, where dusty summer dreams among the pines. This is the spot where spring writes wildflower verses in primrose-pink. While drowsing o'er his rains, the plowmen all and noticing plods along. And where the autumn opens weedy purses of sleepy silver, while the corn-piled wanes rumble the bridge like some deep throat of song. The creek road by Madison Cowine, read from LibriVox.org by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. Calling, the heron flies a thwart, the blue, that sleeps above it, reach on, rocky reach, of water sings by sycamore and beach, in whose warm shade bloom lilies not a few. It is a page whereon the sun and dew, scrawl sparkling words in dawn's delicious speech, a laboratory where the wood-winds teach, dissect each scent and analyze each hue. But otherwise than beautiful, doth it, record the happenings of each summer day, where we may read, as in a catalogue, when passed a thresher, when a load of hay, or when a rabbit, or a bird, that lit, and now a barefoot, truant, and his dog. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Abandoned by Madison Cowine, read from LibriVox.org by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. The hornets build in plaster-dropping rooms, and on its mossy porch the lizard lies, around its chimney, slow the swallow flies, and on its roof the locusts snow their blooms. Like some sad thought, that broods hear old perfumes, haunt its dim stares, the cautious zephyr tries, each gusty door, like some dead hand, then sighs, with ghostly lips among the attic glooms, and now a heron, now a kingfisher, flits in the willows where the riffle seems, at each faint fall to hesitate to leap, fluttering the silence with a little stir. Here summer seems a placid face asleep, and the near world a figment of her dreams. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Omens by Madison Cowine, read from LibriVox.org by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. Sat on the hills the poppied sunset died, slow as a fungus breaking through the crusts, of forest leaves the waning half-moon thrusts, through grey-brown clouds one milky silverside. In her vague light the dogwoods dim, described, seem dying torches flourished by the gusts, the apple orchards seem the restless dusts, of wind-thin mists upon the hills they hide. It is a night of omens whom, late May, beats like a wraith among her train of hours, an apparition with appealing eye, an hesitant foot that walks a willowed way, and, speaking through the fading moon and flowers, bids her prepare her gentle soul to die. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Imperfection by Madison Cowine, read from LibriVox.org by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. Not as the eye hath seen, shall we behold, romance and beauty when we've passed away, but wrought the dull facts of the intimate day, in lice-walled raiment of unusual gold. Not as the ear hath heard, shall we be told, hereafter myth and legend once that lay, warm at the heart of nature, clothing clay, in attributes of no material mould. These were imperfect of necessity that wrought through imperfection for far ends, of perfectness as calm philosophy, teaching a child from his high heaven descends, to earth's familiar things informingly, vesting his thoughts in that it comprehends. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Arcana by Madison Cowine, read from LibriVox.org by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. Earth hath her images of utterance, her hieroglyphic meanings which allude, a simple language of simulitude, into whose secrets science may not glance, in which the mind in nature doth romance, in miracles that baffle if pursued, no guess shall search them and no thought intrude, beyond the limits of her sufferance. No doth the great intelligence above, hide his own thoughts, creation, and attire, forms in the dreams ideal, which he dowers, with immaterial loveliness and love, as essences of fragrance and of fire, preaching the evangils of the stars and flowers. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. There are some souls who may look in on these essential peoples of the earth and air, that have the stars and flowers in their care, and read their soul's suggestive secrecies, art intimates and comrades of the trees, who from them learn what no known schools declare, God's knowledge, and from winds that, singing fair, God's gospel filled with mighty harmonies, souls unto whom the waves impart a word of fuller faith. The sunset and the dawn preach sermons more inspired even than the tongues of Pentecost, as distant heard in forms of change, through nature upward drawn, God doth address the immortal part of man. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. I looked upon a dead girl's face, and heard what seemed the voice of death cry out to me. Deep in her heart, all the agony of her lost dreams, complaining word on word, how on her soul no soul had touched, or stirred her life's sad depths to rippling melody, or made the imaged longing there to be the realization of a hope deferred. So in her life had the love behaved to her, between the lonely chapters of her years, and her young eyes making no golden blur, with God bright face and hair, who led me to her side at last, and bathed me through my tears with death's dumb lips, too late to see and know. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. The Witch by Madison Cowan, read for Liebervox.org by Linda Ray Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. She gropes and hobbles, where the drop-seed rocks, are hairy with the lichens and the twist, of knotted wolf's bane mumbling in the mist, hawk-nosed and wrinkle-eyed with scrawny locks. Let her bent back the moon, slow-sinking mocks, like some lewd evil whom the fiend half-kissed, once at her feet the slipping serpent hissed, and once the owl called to the forest fox. What Sabbath brew does she intend? What root? Now seek for, seal for what satanic spell, of incantations and demonic fire. From her rude hut, hill-hutted in the briar, what dark familiar points her sure pursuit, there with gaunt eyes, red with the glow of hell. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. The Sonambalist by Madison Cowan, read for Liebervox.org by Linda Ray Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. Oaks and a water by the water, ice, ice-green and steadfast as still stars, and hair, yellow as eyes deep in a she-wolf's lair, and limbs, like mist the lightning's flicker dies, the humped oaks huddle under iron skies, the dry wind whirls the dead leaves everywhere, white on the water falls a vulture glare, of moon and black the circling raven flies. Again the power of this thing hath laid, compulsion on me, and I seem to hear, a sweet voice calling me beyond the gates, to long for love I come, each forest glade, seems reaching out, white arms to draw me near, nearer and nearer to the death that waits. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Opium by Madison Cowan, read for Liebervox.org by Linda Ray Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. On reading De Quincey's Confessions of an Opium Eater. I seemed to stand before a temple walled, from shadows and nights on realities, filled with dark music of dead memories, and voices lost in darkness, deep that called, I entered, and beneath the domes high hauled, immensity one forced me to my knees, before a blackness, throne, mid semblances, and spectres crowned with flames of emerald, then lo, two shapes that thundered at my ears, the names of whore and oblivion, priests of this God, and bade me die and dream, then in the heart of hell a thousand years, me seemed I lay dead, while the iron stream of time beat out the seconds one by one. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Music and Sleep by Madison Cowan, read for Liebervox.org by Alicia Messiah. These have a life that hath no part in death, these circumscribe the soul and make it strong. Beneath the breathing of a dream and song, building a world of beauty in a breath, unto the heart the voice of this one saith, ideals its emotions live among. Unto the mind the other speaks a tongue, of visions where the guests, men christen faith, may face the fact of immortality, as may arose its unembodied scent, or star its own reflected radiance. We do not know these saiths subconsciously, to whose mysterious shadows God hath let, no certain shape, no certain continents. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Ambition by Madison Cowan, read for Liebervox.org by Alicia Messiah. Now to my lips lift thou some opiate, of dull forgetfulness, while in thy gaze still lurves the loveless beauty that betrays, and in thy mouth the music that is hate. No promise more has thou to make me wait, no smile to cozen my sick heart with praise. Far, far behind these stretched laborious days, and far before thee labor soon and late. Thine is the thin fire that we deem a star, flying before us ever fugitive. Thy mocking policy still holds afar, and thine the voice to which our longings give, hopes siren face that speaks us sweet and fair, only at last to welcome us with despair. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Despondency by Madison Cowan, read for Liebervox.org by Alicia Messiah. Not all the bravery that day puts on, of gold and azure, ardent or astir, shall ease my soul of sorrow, grief more dear, than all the joy that heavenly hope may dawn. Far up the skies, the rumor of the dawn, may run and ease like some wild torch appear. These shall not change the darkness gathered here, a thought that rusts like an old sword undrawn. Oh, for a place far sunken from the sun, a wild wood cave of primitive rocks and moss, where sleep and silence, breast to married breast, live with their child, night-eyed oblivion, where freed from all the burden of my cross, I might forget, I might forget, and rest. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Despair by Madison Cowan, read for Liebervox.org by Bruce Kechuk. Shot in with phantoms of life's hollow hopes, and shadows of old sins satiety slew, and the young ghosts of the dead dreams love new, out of the day into the night she gropes. Behind her, high, the silvered summit slopes of hope and faith, she will not turn to view, but towards the cave of heartbreak, harsh of hue, she goes, where all the drop seed horror ropes. There is a voice of waters in her ears, and on her brow a wind that never dies. One is the anguish of desired tears, one is the sorrow of unuttered sighs, and burdened with the immemorial years, downward she goes, with never lifted eyes. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Quaterrains by Madison Cowan, read for Liebervox.org by Larry Wilson. Pinure, above his misered embers gaunt and gray, with toil-narled limbs he stoops. Around his hut want like a hobbling hag goes night and day, trying the windows and the doors tight shut. Strategy, craft's silent sister and the daughter deep of contemplation, she who spreads below a hostile tent, soft comfort for her foe, with eyes of jail, watching till he sleep. Tempest, with helms of lightning glittering in the skies, on steeds of thunder, form on cloudy form, terrific beauty in their hair and eyes, sweep down the wild valkyries of the storm. The Lucas Blossom, the spirit spring in rainy raiment met, the spirit summer for moonlit hour, sweet from their greeting kisses, warm and wet, was born the fragrant beauty of this flower. Melancholy, with shadowy immortals of memory about her brow, she sits with eyes that look upon the stream of leth, wearily, in hesitant hands, death's partly opened book, content. Among the meadows of life's sad unease, in labor still renewing her soul's youth, with trust for patience and with love for peace, singing she goes with the calm face of Ruth, life and death. Of our own selves God makes a glass, wherein two shades are imaged passing like a breath, and one is life whose other name is sin, and one is love whose other name is death, sorrow. Death takes her hand and leads her through the waste of her own soul, wherein she hears the voice of lost love's tears, and famishing can but taste the dead sea fruit of life's remembered joys. In the poem this recording is in the public domain. A Last Word by Madison Cowine, read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. Not for myself, but for the sake of song, would I succeed as others who have gave their lives unto her, shaping sure and strong her lovely limbs that made them God and slave. Not for myself, but for the sake of art, would I advance beyond the other's best, winning a deeper secret from her heart, to hang it moon-like mid the starry rest. In the poem this recording is in the public domain. Nature Poems, Second Series. Forward by Madison Cowine, read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. In the first rare spring of song, in my heart's young hours, in my youth was thus I sang, choosy mid the flowers. Fair the dandelion is, but for me too lowly, and the winsome violet is forsooth too holy. But the touch may not, go to, what, a face that speckled like a common milking-maids, whom the sun hath freckled. Then the wild rose is a flirt, and the trillium lily, in her spotless gown is a prude, sanctified and silly. By her cap the Columbine to my mind's to marry, gossips, I would sooner woo, some plebeian berry. And the shy anonymy, well, her face shows sorrow. Pale good soothe, alive to-day, dead and gone to-morrow. Then that whole died, buxom wench, big and blond and lazy, she's been chosen over-ought. Sirs, I mean the daisy. Pleasant persons are they all, but their virtues many faith, I know but good of each, and not ill of any. But I choose a may-apple, she shall be my lady, blooming hidden and refined, sweet in place as shady. In my youth was thus I sang, in my heart's young hours, in the first rare spring of song, choosing mid the flowers. So I hesitated when time alone was reckoned by the hours that fancy smiled, love and beauty beckoned, hard it was for me to choose from the flowers that flattered, and the blossom that I chose soon lay dead and scattered. Hard I found it then. Ah, me. Hard I found the choosing. Harder, harder since I've found all too hard the losing. Happily had I chosen then from the weeds that tangle wayside woodland and the wall of my garden's angle, I had chosen better, yay for these later hours, longer live the weeds, and off sweeter are than flowers. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. First of the insect choir in the spring, we hear his faint voice fluttering in the grass, beneath some blossoms rosy covering, or frond of fern upon a wildwood pass. When in the marsh, in the clamorous orchestras, the shrill high-loads pipe, when in the haw's bee-swarming blooms, or tassling sassafras, sweet threads of silvery song the sparrow draws, bow-like a thwart the vibrant atmosphere, like some dim dream low-breathed in slumber's ear, we hear his cheer, cheer, cheer. All summer long the mellowing meadows thrill to his blithe music. Be it day or night, close gossip of the grass, on field and hill, he serenades the silence with delight. Silence that hears the mellowing slowly split, with ripeness, and the plump peach, hornet bit, loosen and fall, and everywhere the white, warm, silk-like stir of leafy lights that flit, as breezes blow, above which, loudly clear, like joy who sings of life and has no fear, we hear his cheer, cheer, cheer. Then in the autumn, by the waterside, leaf-huddled, or along the weed-grown walks, he dirges low the flowers that have died, or with their ghosts hold solitary talks. Lover of warmth, all day above the click, and crunching of the sorghum press, through thick, sweet steam of juice, all night when, light as chalk, the hunter's moon hangs, or the rustling rick, within the barn, made munching cow and steer. Soft as a memory the heart holds dear, we hear his cheer, cheer, cheer. Kinsman and cousin of the fairy-race, all winter long he sets his sober mirth, that brings good luck to many a fireplace, to folklore song and saga of the hearth. Between the backlog's bluster and the slim, high twittering of the kettle, sounds that him, home comforts, when, outside, the starless earth is icicled in every laden limb. Defying frost and all the sad and seer, like love that dies not and is always near, we hear his cheer, cheer, cheer. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Tree Toad by Madison Kawain, recorded for LibriVox.org by Cornell Nemish, secluded solitary on some underbough, or cradle in a leaf, mid-glimmering light, like puck-dow crouched, happily watching how the slow, totes-tool comes bulging, moon-wide, through loosening loam, or how, against the night, the glow-worm gathers silver to endow the darkness with, or how the dew conspires to hang a dusk with lamps of chili-fires, each blade that shrivels now. O they confederate of the weeper-wheel of owl and cricket, and the cat did, thou gatters'd up the silence in one shrill vibrating note, and sens'd it where half-head and cedars, twilight-sleeps, each azure-lead drooping a line of golden eyeballs still, afar yet near, I hear thy dewy voice within the garden of the hours, up-wise on dusk's deep daffodil. Minstrel of moisture, silent when high-noon shows, her tan-face among the thirsting clover and purging meadows, thy tenebrious tune wakes with the dew, or when the rain is over, thou troubadour of wetness and damp lover of all cool things, admitted comrade-bone of twilight's hush and a little intimate of Eve's first flattering star and delicate round-rim of a rainy moon, our trumpeter of Dorfland, does thy horn inform the gnomes and goblins of the hour when they may gamble under how and thorn straddling each winking web and twinkling flower, or bell-ringer of Elfland, whose tall tower the Lyriodendron is, from whence is born the elf in music of thy bell's deep base, to summon fairies, to their starlit maze, to summon them, or warn the end of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Screech Owl, by Madison Cowine, read for LibriVox.org by Phil Shempf. When one by one the stars have trembled through Eve's shadowy hues of violet rose and fire, as on a pansy bloom the limpid dew orbs its bright beads, and one by one the choir of insects wakes unknotting bush and briar, then through the woods where wandering winds pursue a ceaseless whisper, like an eerie lyre struck in the Earl King's halls, where ghosts and dreams hold revelry, your goblin music screams, shivering and strange, as some strange thought come true. Brown is the agaric that frills dead trees, or those fantastic fungi of the woods that crowd the dampness. Are you kin to these in some mysterious way that still eludes my fancy? You who haunt the solitudes with hag-like wailings, voice that seems to freeze out of the darkness, like the scent which broods rank and rain sodden over autumn nooks, that to the mind might well suggest such looks, ghastly and gray, as pale clairvoyance sees. You people the night with weirdness, lone and drear beneath the stars, you cry your wizard runes, and in the haggard silence, fill with fear your shuddering hoot seems some wild grief that croons mockery and terror, or beneath the moon's cloud-hurrying glimmer. To the startle, dear, crazed madman snatches of old, perished tunes, the witless wit of outcast Edgar there in the wild night, or one with all despair, the mirthless laughter of the fool in layer. In the poem this recording is in the public domain. Gambles down the dense, green twilight of the woods we see not wence. He comes, nor wither, it is a time to brief. He vanishes, swift carrier of some faith, some pixie steed that haunts our charred belief, a goblin glimpse from woodland wade away. What harlequin mood of nature qualified, him so with happiness, and limped him with, such young activity as winds that ride, the ripples have, that dance on every side, as some beams know, that urge the sap and pith through hearts of trees, yet made him to delight, gnome-like in darkness, like a moonlight myth layering in labyrinths of the under-night. Here, by a rock beneath the moss, a hole leads to his home, the den wherein he sleeps, loud by near noises of the cautious mole, tunnelling its mind, like some ungainly troll, or by the tireless cricket there that keeps, picking its drowsy and monotonous loot, or slowly sounds of grass that creeps and creeps, and trees unrolling mighty, root on root. Such is the music of his sleeping hours, they hath another, tis a melody, he trips to, made by the assembled flowers, and light and fragrance laughing mid the bowers, and ripeness busy with the acorn tree, such strange perhaps has filled with muta-maze, the silent music of earth's ecstasy, the satire soul, the form of classic days. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Wild Iris, by Madison Cowine, read for LibriVox.org by Phil Shempf. That day we wandered mid the hills, so lone clouds are not lonelier, the forests lay in emerald darkness round us, many a stone and gnarly root, gray moss, made wild our way, and many a bird, the glimmering light along, showered the golden bubbles of its song. Mid in the valley where the brook went by, silvering the ledges that it rippled from, an isolated slip of fallen sky, epitomizing heaven in its sum, an iris bloomed, blue as if flower disguised, the gaze of spring had there materialized. I have forgotten many things since then, much beauty, and much happiness and grief, and toiled and dreamed among my fellow men, rejoicing in the knowledge life is brief. Tis winter now, so says each barren bow, and face and hair proclaim, tis winter now. I would forget the gladness of that spring. I would forget that day when she and I, between the birdsong and the blossoming, went hand in hand beneath the soft spring sky. Much is forgotten, yea, and yet, and yet the things we would we never can forget. Nor I, how may, then minted treasuries of crow-foot gold, and molded out of light the sorrel's cups, whose elfin chalices of lipid spar were streaked with rosy white. Nor all the stars of twinkling spider wart, and man-drake moons with which her brows were girt. But most of all, yea, it were well for me, me and my heart, that I forget that flower, the blue wild iris, azure fleur de lis, that she and I together found that hour. Its recollection can but emphasize the pain of loss, remindful of her eyes. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. The Path by the Creek by Madison Cowan Read for LibriVox.org by Chad Horner, 24th of May 2019, from Balleclair Northern Ireland. The Path by the Creek. There is a path that leads through purple-iron wades, by Button Bush a mallow along a creek, a path that wildflowers hallow, that wild birds seek, roofed thick with eglentine, and grape and trumpet thine. This side, the blackberry sweet, glow cobalt in the heat. That side a creamy yellow, in summertime, the paw paws slowly mellow, and autumn's prime, strees red, the chickasaw, persimmon, brown, and haw. The glittering dragonfly, a winged gem goes by. The tawny wasp and hornet make drowsy drone. The beetle, like a garnet, basks on the stone, and butterflies float there, spangling with gold lair. Here the brown thrashers hide, and chat and cat-bird chide. The blue kingfisher houses above the stream, and here the heron drowses lost in his dream. The veru's flitting note makes woodlands more remote, and nigh a cow's slowbell tingles from dale to dale, where breeze-drop petals winnow, from blossomy limbs on waters where the minnow faint tickling swims, where in the rift arched shade slim prisms of light are laid. When in the tangled thorn the newman hangs a horn, or mid the sunset's islands guides her canoe. The brown oil in the silence calls, and the dew. Beads glimmering orbs of damp, each one a glow-worm lamp. Then when the night is still, here sings the whip per will, and stilfully sounds of crickets and winds that pass, whispering three bramble-thickets along the grass, feigned with warm scents of hay, seem feet of dreams astray, and where the water shines dark through tree-twisted binds. Some water-spirit, dreaming, braids in her hair a star's reflection, seeming a jewel there, while all the sweet night-long ripples her quiet song. Would I could imitate, O path thy happy state, making my life all beauty, all blim and beam, knowing no other duty but just to dream, and far from pain and woe lead feet that come and go, leading to calm content over ways the master went, through lowly things and humble to peace and love, teaching the lives that stumble to look above, forget the world of toil, and all its mad turmoil. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Where the violet shadows brood under cotton woods and beaches, through whose leaves the restless reaches of the river glance, I've stood, while the red bird in the thrush set to song the morning hush. There, when wakening woods encroach on the shadowy winding waters, and bluits, April's daughters, at the darling spring's approach, star their myriads through the trees, all the land, is one with peace. Under some imposing cliff that with hush and tree and boulder, thrusts a gray gigantic shoulder over the stream, I've oared the skiff, while great clouds of iceberg hue lounge'd along the noonday blue. There, when harvest heights impend over shores of rippling summer, and to greet the fair newcomer June, the wild rose-thickets bend in a million blossoms dressed, all the land is one with rest. On some rock where gaunt of the oak reddens and the somber cedar darkens, like a seachem leader I have lain and watched the smoke of the steamboat far away, trailed along the dying day. There, when margin waves reflect autumn colors, gay and sober, and the Indian girl October, wampum-like in berry's deck, leans above the leaf-struined streams, all the land is one with dreams. Through the bottoms where, out-tossed by the wind's wild hands, a shiver bend the willows or the river, I have walked in sleet and frost, while beneath the cold round moon, frozen gleamed the long lagoon. There, when leafless woods uplift spectral arms as storm-blast splinter, and the hoary-trapper winter builds his camp of ice and drift, with his snow-pelt's furred and shod, all the land is one with God. In the poem this recording is in the public domain. Wings with winds and showers and wonders in the woods again, a whirging impulse born of spring that makes glad April of my soul. No bird, however wild of wing, is more impatient of control. Impetuous of pulse it beats within my blood and bears me hence. Above the housetops and the streets I hear its happy eloquence. It tells me all that I would know of birds and buds, of blooms and bees. I seem to hear the blossoms blow, and leaves unfolding on the trees. I seem to hear the bluebell's ring, faint purple peels of perfume, and the honey-throated poppies fling, their golden laughter, or the land. It calls to me. It sings to me. I hear its far voice, night and day. I cannot choose but go, when tree and flower clamour come away. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. THE ROAD HOME by Madison Kawain Red for LibriVox.org by Matthew D. Robinson Over the hills as the pee-wee flies, under the blue of the southern skies, over the hills where the redbird wings like a scarlet blossom or sits and sings, under the shadow of rock and tree where the warm wind drones with the honey-bee, and the tall wild-carats around you sway their lace-like flowers of cloudy gray, by the black cohosh and its pearl-white plume, a nod in the woodland's odorous gloom, by the old rail-fence in the elder shade that the myriad hosts of the weeds invade, where the butterfly-weed like a coal of fire blurs orange-red through brush and briar, where the penny-royal and mint-smell-sweet and blackberries tangle the humming heat, the old road leads, then crosses the creek where the minnow-dartles a silvery streak, where the cows wade deep through the blue-eyed grass and the flickering dragonflies gleaming pass. That road is easy, however long which wins with beauty as toil with song, and the road we follow shall lead us straight past creek and wood to a farmhouse-gate, past hill and hollow when scents are blown of dew-wet clover that scythes have moan, to a house that stands with porches wide and gray low roof on the green hillside, colonial stately mid-shade and shine of the locus-tree and the southern pine, with its orchard-acres and meadow-lands stretched out before it like welcoming hands, and gardens where in the merc-sweet June magnolias blossom with many a moon of fragrance, and in the felled-spar-light of August roses bloom red and white. In a wood-bind arbor, a perfumed place, a slim girl sits with listening face, her bonnet by her, a sun-beam lies on her lovely hair in her earnest eyes, her eyes as blue as the distant deeps of the heavens above where the high hawk sleeps, a book beside her wherein she read till she saw him coming, she heard his tread, come home at last, come back from the war, in his eyes a smile on his brow a scar, to the south come back who wakes from her dream to the love and the peace of a new regime. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Drowth by Madison Kawine Red for LibriVox.org by Matthew D. Robinson The hot sunflowers by the glaring pike lift shields of sultry brass, the teaseltops pink-thorned advance with bristling spike-on-spike against the furious sunlight. Field and cops are sick with summer, now with breathless stops the locust symbol, now grasshoppers beat their castanets and rolled in dust a team like some mean life wrapped in its sorry dream, an empty wagon rattles through the heat. Where now the blue-blue flags, the flowers whose mouths are moist and musky, where the sweet-breathed mint that made the brook bank erby, where the south's wild morning glories rich in hues that hint at coming showers that the rainbows tint, where all the blossoms that the wildwood knows, the frail oxalis hidden in its leaves, the indian pipe pale as a soul that grieves, the freckled touch-me-nod and forest rose. Dead, dead, all dead beside the drowth-burnt brook, shrouded in moss or in the shriveled grass, where waved their bells from which the wild bee shook the dew-drop ones, gaunt in a nightmare mass the rank-weeds-crowd, through which the cattle pass thirsty and lean, seeking some meager spring, closed in with thorns on which stray bits of wool the panting sheep have left that sought the cool, from morn till evening wearily wandering. No bird is heard, no throat to whistle awake the sleepy hush, to let its music leak fresh bubble-like through bloom-roofs of the break. Only the green-blue heron famine weak, searching the stale pools of the minoless creek, utters its call, and then the rain-crow, too, false prophet now croaks to the stagnant air, while overhead, still as if painted there, a buzzard hangs black on the burning blue. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. THE BROKEN DROWTH by Madison Coine redforlibrivox.org by Bruce Gachuk It seemed the listening forest held its breath before some vague and unapparent form of fear, approaching with the wings of death on the impending storm. Above the hills big bellying clouds loomed, black and ominous, yet silent as the blue that pools calm heights of heaven, deepening back twixed clouds of snow-drift hue. Then instantly as when a multitude shout riot and war through some tumultuous town, innumerable voices swept the wood, as wild the wind rushed down, and fears and few, as when a strong man weeps, great raindrops dashed the dust, and overhead, ponderous and vast down the prodigious deeps, went slow the thunders tread, and swift and furious as when giants fence, the lightning foils of tempest went insane, then far and near, sonorous earth grew dense with long sweet sweep of rain. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Feud by Madison Cowine, read for LibriVox.org by Phil Shempf. A mile of lane hedged high with iron weeds and dying daisies, white with sun that leads downward into a wood, through which a stream steals like a shadow, over which is laid a bridge of logs, worn deep with many a team, sunk in the tangled shade. Far off a wood-dove lifts its lonely cry, and in the sleepy silver of the sky a gray hawk wheels scarcely larger than a hand. From point to point the road grows worse and worse, until that place is reached where all the land seems burdened with some curse. A ragged fence of pickets warped and sprung, on which the fragments of a gate are hung, divides a hill, the fox and groundhog haunt, a wilderness of briars, or whose tops a battered barn is seen, low-ruffed and gaunt, midfields that know no crops, fields over which a path, or whelmed with burrs and ragweeds, noisy with the grasshoppers, leads. Lost, it resolute, as paths the cows were through the woods. Unto a woodshed, then, with wrecks of windows, to a huddled house where men have murdered men, a house whose tottering chimney clay and rock is seamed and crannied, whose lame door and lock are bullet-board, around which there and here are sinister stains, one dreads to look around. The place seems thinking of that time of fear and dares not breathe a sound. Within is emptiness. The sunlight falls on faded journals papering its walls, on advertisement-chromos, torn with time around a hearth where wasps and spiders build. The house is dead. Me seems that night of crime, it too was shot and killed. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. I see a phantom galley and its hull is banked with oars, with ghostly oars that move to song, a song of dreams long dead. Oh, we are sick of rowing here, with toil our arms are numb, with smiting year on weary year salt furrows of the foam. Our journey's end is never near, and will no nearer come. Beyond our reach the shores appear of far Elysium. Within a land of cataracts and mountains old and sand, beneath whose heavens ruins rise, or which the stars burn red, I see a spectral cavalcade with crucifix in hand, and shadowy armor march and sing a song of dreams long dead. Oh, we are weary marching on, our limbs are travel-worn, with cross and sword from dawn to dawn we wend with remnant torn. The leaks to go, the leaks we've gone, are sand and rock and thorn. The way is long to Avalon, beyond the deeps of morn. They are the cursed, the souls who yearn and ever more pursue the vision of a vain desire, a splendor far ahead, to whom God gives the poet's dream without the grasp to do, the artist's hope without the scope between the quick and dead. I, too, am weary toiling where the winds and waters beat. When shall I ease the ore I bear and rest my tired feet? When will the white moon cease to glare, the red suns veil their heat, and from the heights blow sweet the air of love's divine retreat? End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Sunset and Storm by Madison Cowine read for LibriVox.org by Bruce Kachuk Deep with divine tautology, the sunset's mighty mystery again has traced the scroll like west with hieroglyphs of burning gold. Forever new, forever old, its miracle is manifest. Time lays the scroll away, and now above the hills a giant brow night lifts of cloud and from her arm barbaric black upon the world with thunder wind and fire is hurled. Her awful argument of storm. What part, O man, is yours in such whose awe and wonder are in touch with nature speaking rapture to your soul, yet leaving in your reach no human word of thought or speech expressive of the thing you view? End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Beach Blooms by Madison Cowine read for LibriVox.org by Bruce Kachuk Among the valleys, the wild oxalis lifts up its chalice of pink and pearl and balsam breathing from out their sheathing the myriad breathing green leaves on curl the whole world brightens with spring that lightens the foot that frightens the building thrush where water tosses on ferns and mosses the squirrel crosses the beach in hush and vision on vision like ships elision on some white mission sails cloud on cloud with sense of clover the winds brim over and in the cover the stream is loud twix bloom that blanches the orchard branches old farms and ranches gleam in the gloam through fields fore sowing mid blossoms blowing the cows come lowing the cows come home where ways are narrow of vespers barrow flits like an arrow of living rhyme the red sun poises and farmyard noises mixed with glad voices of milking time when dusk disposes of all its roses and darkness closes and work is done the moon's white feather in starry weather and two together whose hearts are one end of poem this recording is in the public domain worship by madison kawain red for libra box dot or by larry wilson the mornings raise voices of gold in the almighty's praise the sunset soaring coral crimson from far shore to shore each is a blast reverberant of color seen as vast concussions that the vocal firmament in worship sounds or every continent not for our ears the cosmic music of the rolling spheres that sweeps the skies music we hear but only with our eyes for all to weak our mortal frames to bear the words they speak those detonations that we named the dawn and sunset hues earth's harmony puts on in the poem this recording is in the public domain unheard by madison kawain red for libra box dot or g by cornell nemesh rino nevada all things are roth of melody unheard yet full of speaking spells within the rock within the tree a soul of music dwells a mute symphonic sense that thrills the silent frame of mortal things its heart beats in the ancient hills and in each flower sings to harmony all growth is set each seed is but a music mode from which each plant each violet evolves its purple note compact of melody the rose woos the soft wind with strain on strain of crimson and the lily blows its white bars to the rain trees are peons and the grass one long green fugue beneath the sun song is their life and all shall pass shall end when song is done end of poem this recording is in the public domain reincarnation by madison kawain red for libra box dot org high in the place of outraged liberty he ruled the world an emperor and god his iron armies swept the land and sea and conquered nations trembled at his nod by him the love that fills man's soul with light and makes a heaven of earth was crucified lust crowned he lived yay lived in god's despite and old in infamies a king he died justice begins now many centuries and some vile body must his soul atone as slave as beggar loathsome with disease less than the dog at which we fling a stone end of poem this recording is in the public domain on chinowith's run by madison kawain read for libra box dot org by matthew d robinson i thought of the road through the glen with its hawks nest high in the pine with its rock where the fox had his den mid tangles of sumac and vine where she swore to be mine i thought of the creek and its banks now glooming now gleaming with sun the rustic bridge building of planks the bridge over chinowith's run where i wooed her and won i thought of the house in the lane with its pinks and its sweet minuet its fence and the gate with its chain its porch where the roses hung wet where i kissed her and met then i thought of the family graves walled rudely with stone in the west where the sorrowful cedar tree waves and the wind is a spirit distressed where they laid her to rest and my soul overwhelmed with despair cried out on the city and mart how i longed how i longed to be there away from the struggle and smart by her and my heart by her and my heart in the west laid sadly together as one on her grave for a moment to rest far away from the noise in the sun on chinowith's run end of poem this recording is in the public domain the roses mourn for her who sleeps within the tomb for her each lily flower weeps dew and perfume in each neglected flower bed each blossom droops its lovely head they miss her touch they miss her tread her face a bloom of happy bloom the very breezes grieve for her a lonely grief for her each tree is sore each blade and leaf the foliage rocks itself in size and to its woe the wind replies they miss her girlish laugh and cries whose life was brief was all too brief the sunlight too seems pale with care or sick with woe the memory haunts it of her hair it's golden glow no more within the bramble break the sleepy bloom is kissed awake the sun is sad for her dear sake whose head lies low lies dim and low the bird that's saying so sweet is still at dusk and dawn no more it makes the silence thrill of wood and lawn in vain the buds when it is near open each pink and perfumed ear the song it sings she will not hear who now is gone is dead and gone ah well she sleeps who loved them well the birds and bowers the fair the young the lovable who once was ours alas that loveliness must pass must come to lie beneath the grass that youth and joy must fade alas and die like flowers or sweetest flowers end of poem this recording is in the public domain The Quest by Madison Cowan redforleavervox.org by Linda Marie Nielsen Vancouver BC first i asked the honey bee busy in the balmy bowers saying sweetheart tell it me have you seen her honey bee she is cousin to the flowers all the sweetness of the south in her wild rose face and mouth but the bee passed silently then i asked the forest bird warbling by the woodland waters saying dearest have you heard have you heard her forest bird she is one of music's daughters never song so sweet by half as the music of her laugh but the bird said not a word next i asked the evening sky hanging out its lamps of fire saying loved one passed she by tell me tell me evening sky she the star of my desire sister whom the pleads lost and my soul's high pentecost but the sky made no reply where is she ah where is she she to whom both love and duty bind me yay immortally where is she ah where is she simple of the earth soul's beauty i have lost her help my heart find her her who is a part of the pagan soul of me me end of poem this recording is in the public domain before the rain by madison k win red for lebervox.org by linda mary nielsen vancouver bc before the rain low in the obscure east weak and morose the moon hung sickly gray around its disc the storm mists cracked and creased wove an enormous web wherein it lay like some white spider hungry for its prey vindictive looked the scowling firmament in which each star that flashed a dagger ray seemed filled with malice of some dark intent the marsh frog croat and underneath the stone the peevish cricket raised a creaking cry within the world these sounds were heard alone save when the ruffian wind swept from the sky making each tree like some sad spirit sigh or shook the clumsy beetle from its weed that in the drowsy darkness bungling by sharded the silence with its feverish speed slowly the tempest gathered hours passed before was heard the thunder's sullen drum rumbling night's hollow and the earth at last restless with waiting like a woman dumb with doubting of the love that should have come her casement hours ago avowed again mid protestations joy that he had come and all night long i heard the heavens explain end of poem this recording is in the public domain after rain by madison kawin redforlebervox.org by lindon rey nielson thank uver bc behold the blossom bosomed day again with all the star white hours in her train laughs out of pearl lights through a golden ray that leaning on the woodland wildness blends a sprinkled amber with the showers that lay their oblong emeralds on the leafy ends behold her bend with maiden braided brows above the wildflower sideways with its strain of dewy happiness to kiss again each drop to death or under rainy bows with fingers fragrant as the woodland rain gather the sparkles from the sycamore to set within the core of crimson roses girdling her hips where each bud dreams and drips smoothing her blue black hair where many a tusk of iris flashes like the falchions keen a fairy round blue banners of their queen is it a niad singing in the dusk that haunts the spring where all the moss is musk with footsteps of the flowers on the banks or but a wild bird voluble with thanks balm for each blade of grass the hours prepare a festival each weeds invited to each bee is drunken with the honeyed air and all the heaven is eloquent with blue the wet hay glitters and the harvester tinkles his scythe and twinkling as the dew that shall not spare blossom or briar in its sweeping path an air it cut one swath rings them they die and tells them to prepare what is the spice that haunts each glen and glade a dry it slips who slumbers in the shade a fawn who lets the heavy ivy wreath slip to his thigh as reaching up he pulls the chestnut blossoms in whole bosomfuls a sylvan spirit whose sweet mouth doth breathe her viewless presence near us unafraid or troops of ghosts of blooms that whitely weighed the brook whose wisdom knows no other song but that the bird sings where it builds beneath the wild rose and sits singing all day long oh let me sit with silence for a space a little while forgetting that fierce part of man that struggles in the toiling mart where god can look into my heart's own heart from unsold heights made amiable with grace and where the sermons that the old oaths keep can steal into me and what better then than turning to the moss a quiet face to fall asleep a little while to sleep and dream of wiser worlds and wiser men end of poem this recording is in the public domain sunset clouds by madison kawin redford libervox.org by vinda mary nielson vancouver bc low clouds the lightning veins and cleaves torn from the wilderness of storm swept westward like enormous leaves or field and farm and in the west on burning skies their wrath is quenched their hate is hushed and deep their drifted thunder lies with splendor flushed the black turns gray the gray turns gold and seed in deeps of radiant rose summits of fire manifold they now repose what dreams they bring what thoughts reveal they have their source in loveliness through which the doubts i often feel grow less and less through which i see that other night that cloud called death transformed of love to flame and pointing with its light to life above end of poem this recording is in the public domain riches by madison kawin redford libervox.org by vinda mary nielson vancouver bc what minds the morning heavens unfold what far alaskus of the sky that veined with elemental sierra on sierra rise heap up the gold of all the world the ore that makes men fools and slaves what is it to the gold cloud curled that rivers through the sunsets caves search earth for riches all who will the gold that soils that turns to dust mine be the wealth no thief can steal the gold of beauty not can rust end of poem this recording is in the public domain the age of gold by madison kawin redford libervox.org by vinda mary nielson vancouver bc the clouds the tower in storm that beat arterial thunder in their veins the wild flowers lifting shyly sweet their perfect faces from the plains all high all lowly things of earth for no vague end have had their birth low strips of mist that meshed the moon above the foaming waterfall and mountains that god's hand hath hewn and for swear the great winds call within the grasp of such a sea are parts of a conspiracy to seize the soul with beauty hold the heart with love and thus fulfill within ourselves the age of gold that never died and never will as long as one true nature feels the wonders that the world reveals end of poem this recording is in the public domain a song for labor by madison kawin redford libervox.org by vinda mary nielson vancouver bc oh the morning needs the dewy needs where he plows and harrows and sows the seeds singing a song of manly deeds in the blossoming springtime weather the heart in his bosom as high as the word said to the sky by the mating bird while the beat of an answering heart is heard his heart and hers together oh the noonday heights the sunlit heights where he stoops to the harvest his keen scythe smites singing a song of the work that requires in the ripening summer weather the soul in his body as light as the sigh of the little cloud breeze that cools the sky while he hears an answering soul reply his soul and hers together oh the evening fails the twilight fails where he labors and sweats to the thud of flails singing a song of the toil that he hails in the fruitful autumn weather in heart and in soul as free from fears as the first white star in the sky that appears while the music of life and of love he hears her life and his together end of poem this recording is in the public domain the love of loves by madison call wine red for liver vox dot org I have not seen her face and yet she is more sweet than anything of earth then rose or violet that winds of may and sunbeams bring of all we know past or to come that beauty holds within its net she is the high compendium and yet I have not touched her robe and still she is more dear than lyric words and music or then strains that fill the throbbing throats of forest birds of all we mean by poetry that rules the soul and charms the will she is the deep epitome and still she is my world ah pity me a dream that flies whom I pursue whom I pursue who ere they be who toil for art and there and do the shadow love for whom they sigh the far ideal affinity for whom they live and gladly die ah me end of poem this recording is in the public domain things by madison call win red for liver vox dot org by linda mary nielson vancouver bc there are three things of earth that help us more than those of heavenly birth that all implore then love or faith or hope for which we strive and grope the first one is desire who takes our hand and fills our hearts with fire none may withstand through whom we're lifted far above both moon and star the second one is dream who leads our feet by an immortal gleam to vision sweet through whom our forms put on dim attributes of dawn the last of these is toil who maketh true within the world's turmoil the other two through whom we may behold ourselves with kings enrolled end of poem this recording is in the public domain immortals by madison call win red for liver vox dot org by linda mary nielson vancouver bc as some worn moment of repose in one rich rose sums all the summer's lovely bloom and pure perfume so did her soul epitomize a hope septic life wise who lies before us now with glitted eyes face emirant of truth crowning her youth as some melodious note or stream may so contain all of sweet music in one chord or lyric word so did her loving heart suggest all dreams that make life blessed who lives before us now with pulseless breast loves asphodel of duty crowning her beauty end of poem this recording is in the public domain a lullaby by madison call win red for liver vox dot org by linda mary nielson vancouver bc in her wimple of wind and her slippers of sleep the twilight comes like a little goose girl hurting her owls with many two woos her little brown owls in the forest deep where dimly she walks in her whispering shoes and gown of glimmering pearl sleep sleep little one sleep this is the road to rucka by town rucka by lullaby where dreams are cheap here you can buy any dream for a crown sleep sleep little one sleep the cradle you lie in is soft and is deep the wagon that takes you to rucka by town now you go up sweet now you go down rucka by lullaby now you go down and after the twilight comes midnight who wears a mantle of purple so old so old who stables the lily white moon it is said in a wonderful chamber with violet stairs up which you can see her come silent of tread on whose up hill silver and gold dream dream little one dream this is the way to lullaby land lullaby rucka by wear white as cream sugar plum powers drop sweets in your hand dream dream little one dream the cradle you lie in is tight at each seam the boat that goes sailing to lullaby land over the sea sweet over the sand lullaby rucka by over the sand the twilight and midnight are lovers you know and each to the other is true is true and there on the moon through the heavens they ride with the little brown owls all huddled a row through meadows of heaven where every side blossom the stars and the dew rest rest little one rest rucka by town is in lullaby owl rucka by lullaby set like a nest deep in the heart of a song and a smile rest rest little one rest the cradle you lie in is warm as my breast the white bird that bears you to lullaby owl out of the east sweet into the west rucka by lullaby into the west end of poem this recording is in the public domain pestilence by madison kawin red for lebervox.org by lynda mary nielsen vancouver bc high on a throne of noisome ooze and heat mid rotting trees of bayou and lagoon ghastly she sits beneath the skeleton moon a tawny horror coining at her feet fever whose eyes keep watching serpent like until her eyes shall bid him rise and strike end of poem this recording is in the public domain musings by madison kawin red for lebervox.org by lynda mary nielsen vancouver bc one inspiration all who have toiled for art who've won or lost sat equal priests at her high pentecost only the chrism and sacrament of flame anointing all inspired not all the same two apportionment how often in our search for joy below hoping for happiness we chance on woe three victory they who take courage from their own defeat are victors too no matter how much beat four preparation how often hopes fairflower blooms riches where the soul was fertilized with black despair five disillusion those unrequited in their love who die have never drained life's chief illusion dry six success success allures us in the earth and skies we seek to win her but to amorous mocking she flees us happily were we wise we should not strive and she would come to us seven science moranda like above the world she waves the wand of prospero and beautiful ariel the airy caliban the dull lightning and steam are her unwilling slaves eight the universal wind wild sun of heaven with laughter and alarm now east now west now north now south he goes bearing in one harsh hand dark death and storm and in the other sunshine and a rose nine compensation yay whom he loves the lord god chaseneth with disappointments so that this sigh death through suffering and failure they know hell to make them worthy in that heaven to dwell a love's attainment where they come to be parts of its beauty and divinity ten poppies summer met sleep at sunset dreaming within the south drugged with his sold steep slumber red with her heart's hot drought these are the drowsy kisses she pressed upon his mouth eleven her eyes and mouth there is no paradise like that which lies deep in the heavens of her as your eyes there is no eden here on earth that glows like that which smiles rich in her mouse red rose twelve her soul to me not only does her soul suggest palms and the peace of tropic shore and wood but oceaned far beyond the golden west the fortunate islands of true womanhood thirteen her face the gladness of our southern spring the grace of summer and the dreaminess of fall our parts of her sweet nature such a face was ruse me think divinely spiritual and of poem this recording is in the public domain the message of the lilies by madison kawin red for libervox dot org by lynda mary nelson vancouver bc my soul and i went walking beneath the moon of spring the lilies pale were talking we heard them murmuring from dimly moonlit places they thrust long throats of white and lifted fairy faces of fragrant snow and light their language was an essence yet clear as any birds and from it grew a presence as music grows from words a spirit born of silence and chastity and do among elysian islands were not more white to view a spirit born of fire and holiness and snow within the heavens desire were not more pure to know he smiled among them lifting pale hands of prayer and peace and through the moonlight drifting came words to me like these we are his lilies lilies whose praises here we sing we are the lilies lilies of christ our lord and king end of poem this recording is in the public domain anthem of dawn by madison kawin red for libervox dot org by larry wilson then up the orient heights to the zenith that balanced the crescent up and far up and over the heaven grew arabescent vibrant with rose and with ruby from hands of a harpist dawn smiting symphonic fires in the firmaments barbaton and the east was a priest who adored with offerings of gold and gems and a wonderful carpet unrolled for the inaccessible hymns of the glittering robes of her limbs that lily and amethyst swept glorying on and on through temples of cloud and mist then out of the splendor and richness that burned like a magic stone the torrent suffusion deepened and dazzled and broadened and shone the pomp and the pageant of color triumphal procession of glare the sun like a king and armor breathing splendor from feet to hair stood forth with majesty girdled as a hero who towers afar where the bannered gates are bristling hells and the walls are roaring war and broad on the back of the world like a cherubim's fiery blade the effulgent gaze of his aspect fell in glittering accolade then billowing blue like an ocean rolled from the shores of dawn to even and the stars like rafts went down and the moon like a ghost ship driven a feather of foam from port to port of the cloud built aisles that dotted with pearl and cameo bays of the day her canvas webbed and rotted lay lost in the gulf of heaven while over her mixed and melted the beautiful children of morn whose bodies are opal belted the beautiful daughters of dawn who over and under and after the river radiance wrestled and rainbowed heaven with laughter of halcyon south fire oh dawn thou visible mirth thou hallelujah of heaven hosanna of earth in the porn this recording is in the public domain the lanes and by madison cowain read for liberbox.org by linda mary nielson vancouver bc no more to strip the roses from the rose sprays of her porch's place i dreamed last night that i was home kissing a rose her face i must have smiled in sleep who knows the rose aroma filled the lane i saw her white hands lifted rose that welcomed home again and yet when i awoke so on my old face wet with icy tears somehow it seems she was not gone though dead now 30 years the clouds roll up and the clouds roll down over the roofs of the little town out in the hills where the pike winds by field of clover and bottoms of rye you will hear no sound but the barking cough of the striped chick monk where the lean leads off you will hear no bird but the sap sucker far off in the forest that seems to purr as the warm wind fondles its top grown hot like the dorsal back of an ocelot you will see no thing but the shine and shade of briars that climb and of weeds that wade the glittering creeks of the heat that fills the dusty road and the red keel hills and all day long in the penny royale the grasshoppers at their anvil's toile thick click of their tireless hammers drum and the weasy belts of their bellows hum tinkers who solder the silence and heat to make the loneliness more complete around old rails where the blackberries are reddening ripe and the bumblebees are a drowsy rustle of summer skirts and the bob white swing is the fan she flirts under the hill through the iron weeds and ox eye daisies and milk weeds leads the path forgotten of all but one where elder bushes are sick with sun and wild raspberries branch big blue veins or the face of the rock where the old spring rains is sparkling splinters of molten spar on the gravel bed where the tadpoles are you will find the pales of a fallen fence and the tangled orchard and vineyard dense with the weedy neglect of 30 years the garden there where the soft sky clears like an old sweet face that has dried its tears the garden plot where the cabbage grew and the pompous pumpkin and beans that blew balloons of white by the melon patch maze and tomatoes that seem to catch oblong amber and agate balls globed of the sun in the frosty falls long rows of currents and gooseberries and the balsam gourd with its honey bees and here was a nook for the princess plumes the snapdragon and the poppy blooms quaint sweet williams and pansy flowers and the morning glories bewildered flowers tipping their cornucopia's up for the humming birds that came to sup and over it all was the Sabbath peace of the land whose lap was the love of these and the old log house where my innocence died with my boyhood buried side by side shall a man with a face as withered and gray as the wasp nest stowed in a loft away where the hornets haunt and the mortar drops from the loosened logs of the clapboard tops whom vice has aged as the rotting rooms the rain where memories haunt the glooms a hitch in his joints like the room that gnaws in the rasping hinge of the doors the jars a harsh cracked throat like the old stone flew where the swallows build the summer through shall a man I say with the spider sins that the long here spin in the outs and ends of his soul returning to sea once more his boyhoods home where his life was poor with toil and tears and their fretfulness but rich with health and the hopes that bless the unsoiled wealth of a vigorous youth shall he not take comfort and know the truth in his threadbare raiment of falsehood yay in his crumbled past he shall kneel and pray like a pilgrim come to the shrine again of the homely saints that shall soothe his pain and arise and depart made clean again years of care cannot efface visions of the hills and trees closing in its dam and race nor the mile long memories of the mill streams lovely place how the sunsets used to stain mirrors of the waters lying under eaves made dark with rain where the red bird westward flying lit to try its song again dingles hills and woods and springs where we come in calm and storm swinging in the grapevine swings waiting where the rocks were warm with our fishing nets and strings here the road plunged down the hill under ash and chink up in where the grasshoppers would drill ears of silence with their din to the willow girdled mill there the path beyond the ford takes the wood side just below shallows that the lily's sword where the scarlet blossoms blow of the trumpet fine and gourd summer winds that sink with heat on the pelted waters window moony paddles that repeat crescents where the startled minnow beats a glittering retreat summer winds that bear the scent of the ironweed and mint weary with sweet freight and spent on the deeper pools in print stumbling steps whose ripples dent summer winds that split the husk of the peach and nectarine trail along the amber dusk hazy skirts of gold and green spilling balms of dew and musk where with balls of bursting juice summer sees the red wild plum strew the gravel ripened loose autumn hears the paw paw drum plumpness on the rocks that bruise there we found the water beach one forgotten august noon with a hornet nest in reach like a fairyland balloon full of bustling fairy speech some invasion sure it was for we heard the captain's gold waspish cavalry a buzz troopers uniformed in gold sable slashed to charge on us could i find the sedgey angle where the dragonflies would turn slender flittings into spangle on the sunlight or would burn where the berries made a tangle sparkling green and brassy blue ronde viewing by the stream bands of elf bandetti who brigands of the bloom and beam drunken were with honeydew could i find the pond that lay where vermillion blossoms showered fragrance down the daisied way that the sassafras in powered with the spice of early may could i find it should i seek the old mill its weather beaten wheel and gable by the creek with its warping roof warm eaten dusty rafters worn and weak where old shadows haunt old places loft and hopper stare and bin ghostly with the dust that laces webs that usher phantoms in wistful with remembered faces while the frogs grave litanese drows in far off antiphone supplicating till the eyes of dead friendships long alone in the dusky corners rise moonbeams or the twinkling tip of a star or in the darkling twilight flyer flies there that dip as if night a mirrored sparkling jewels from her hands let slip where i dream my youth still crosses with a corn sack for the meal through the sprinkled ferns and mosses to the gray mills likened wheel where the water drips and tosses end of poem this recording is in the public domain enchantment by madison kawin redfordlebervox.org by linda mary nielson thank uber bc the deep seclusion of this forest path or which the green boughs weave a canopy along which blue it and an enemy spread a dim carpet where the twilight hath her dark abode and sweet as aftermath wood fragrance roams has so enchanted me that yonder blossoming bramble seems to be some silvin resting rosy from her bath has so inspelled me with tradition's dreams that every foam white stream that twinkling flows and every bird that flutters wings of tan or warbles hidden to my fancy seams a nyad dancing to a fawn who blows wild woodland music on the pipes of pan end of poem this recording is in the public domain in the forest by madison kawin redfordlebervox.org by linda mary nielson thank uber bc one well might deem among these miles of woods such were the forests of the holy grail brosley end and deen where clothe in mail the nights of arthur road and all the broods of legend layered and where no sound intrudes upon the ear except the glimmering whale of some far bird or in some flowery swale a brook that murmurs to the solitudes might think he hears the laugh of vivian blent with the moan of merlin muttering bound by his own magic to one stony spot and in the cloud that looms above the glen in which the sun burns like the table round might dream he sees the towers of camalot end of poem this recording is in the public