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XXVIII. EXPECTANCY
I cannot tell why some things hold for meA sense of unplumbed marvels to befall,Or of a rift in the horizon's wallOpening to worlds where only gods can be.There is a breathless, vague expectancy,As of vast adventures, uncorporeal,Ecstasy-fraught, and as a day-dream free.
It is in sunsets, and strange city spires,Old villages and woods and misty downs,South winds, the sea, low hills, and lighted towns,Old gardens, half-heard songs, and the moon's fires.But though its lure alone makes life worth living,None gains or guesses what it hints at giving.
XXIX. NOSTALGIA
Once every year, in autumn's wistful glow,The birds fly out over an ocean waste,Calling and chattering in a joyous hasteTo reach some land their inner memories know.Great terraced gardens where bright blossoms blow,And lines of mangoes luscious to the taste,And temple groves with branches interlacedOver cool paths—all these their vague dreams show.
They search the sea for marks of their old shore—For the tall city, white and turreted—But only empty waters stretch ahead,So that at last they turn away once more.Yet sunken deep where alien polyps throng,The old towers miss their lost, remembered song.
XXX. BACKGROUND
I never can be tied to raw, new things,For I first saw the light in an old town,Where from my window huddled roofs sloped downTo a quaint harbor rich with visionings.Streets with carved doorways where the sunset beamsFlooded old fanlights and small window panes,And Georgian steeples topped with gilded vines—These were the sights that shaped my childhood dreams.
Such treasures, left from times of cautious leaven,Cannot but loose the hold of flimsier wraithsThat flit with shifting ways and muddled faithsAcross the changeless walls of earth and heaven.They cut the moment's thongs, and leave me freeTo stand alone before eternity.
