The Earth Turns South/The Return

by Clement Richardson Wood

IV.
A STAR COMES SINGING

To the memory of
Warfield Creath Richardson

THE RETURN

"Back to the earth," a voice whispers,
"Back to the bare bosom of the ground,
To the shaggy-haired pines, and the pungent carpet beneath,
To the lisp of waves, chiding our forgetfulness,
To the whispered wind, and its roaring summons on high peaks,
And the hurled lightning,
Arms spread and breast bared to receive it!"

A cultured onlooker counsels,
"But this is regression, retreat!
Rather plunge forward into the roar of modern life,
The whirr of machinery, the red furnace gleam
On the glistening backs of half-naked toilers,
The unleashed passion of labor against capital,
With a fantasied and regulated Utopia
Gleaming at the end of the way
Like a Doré illustration
Of New Jerusalem!
This is the part of modern man."

Shall I refuse to look at the moon,
Until it adopts an 8-hour day?
Shall I close myself from the sun's glow
Till it readjust its wasteful routine?
Shall I condemn the starry dipper as inartistic and unhygienic,
When compared with individual drinking cups?
Shall I banish Sirius and the Milky Way,
Until they have received the benignant civilized blessings
Of life today?

Back to the earth!
Back to the wind and the tempest's flame,
And the wheeling stars.
Give them a wide gesture of greeting;
Let their high high harmony flow into your stumbling soul,
Flame up to their unlegislated beauty.