Thanks for the silent greeting ! I shall prize,
Beyond June s rose, the scentless flower of Rome.
All the Campagna spreads before my sight,
The mouldering wall, the Caesars tombs unwreathed,
Rome and the Tiber, and the yellow light,
Wherein the honey-colored blossom breathed.
But most I thank it egoists that we be
For proving then and there you thought of me.
THE CRANES OF IBYCUS.
THERE was a man who watched the river flow
Past the huge town, one gray November day.
Round him in narrow high-piled streets at play
The boys made merry as they saw him go,
Murmuring half-loud, with eyes upon the stream,
The immortal screed he held within his hand.
For he was walking in an April land
With Faust and Helen. Shadowy as a dream
Was the prose-world, the river and the town.
Wild joy possessed him ; through enchanted skies
He saw the cranes of Ibycus swoop down.
He closed the page, he lifted up his eyes,
Lo a black line of birds in wavering thread
Bore him the greetings of the deathless dead!
