Far Horizons

by Bliss Carman

 

MIRALOMA

 
THERE is a hill on Saanich
And a wild grove thereby,—
I never knew so fair a place
This side of Arcady.

Blue and at peace about it,
5
The waters of All Bay
As magical as those whereon
The isle of Sappho lay.

In spring the small wood lilies
Go dancing on the breeze,
10
Where the sun weaves its ancient spell
Among the shadowing trees.

The minstrel air recaptures
The haunting melody
Of sunlit groves and lyric days
15
By the Sicilian sea,

Where one might find at evening
Pan’s hoofprint on the shore,
Or traces where a fleeing nymph
Had passed an hour before;
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Where life had time to tarry
Through golden hours all still
Under the green arbutus shade
With Dawn or Daffodil, —

Hearing the songs of Flaccus

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With his Falernian wine,
Or Virgil’s stately questioning,
So human, so divine.

O beauties of old Hellas
And songs of yesteryear,
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Were ever in your Golden Age
Such golden hours as here,—

Today, in Miraloma,
The welcome of a friend,
By peaceful waters of the West.
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At Far Horizons’ end!