Who is the sleeping giant
That sprawls beneath this monstrous, uncouth tomb,
Bare in the searching moonlight
Older than the hills?

Sometimes at ardent midday

In a persistent, dazzling flame of azure
The tomb becomes a castle
With ivory-coloured walls.

Then into deep crevasses
Painted webs of shadow may be flung.

There it glitters softly
In the deep blue water,
Old loneliness, old beauty,
Hiding some savage secret,—power, or lust—
Out of a far-off time—

Out of the naked days. [page 73]

THE ROCK AT BON ECHO

Once in the twilight aisles of Amiens
I thought I knew what shadows were,
Creeping in golden dust and greying dust,
And trooping down dim flights of measured air,
Liquid in spacing, that those arches span.

But just last night, before the moon was up,
Our little boat stole close against these crags
That out-rear arches and reject the dark.
And gradually the purple of the rock
Melted before it; and again they came

Creeping in golden dust, and greying dust,
And crowding down those giant flights of stair
That open slowly as eternity,
To hold the feet of shadows, lost in night. [page 74]

JUNIPER RING

Juniper ring on the granite rock,
Deep and green and perfectly planned:
Looking at you I understand
Circle-magic of old.

You had a fragile relative

Blooming only an April ago,
When a crocus cup on a bed of snow
Promised eternal things.

It will be longer, Juniper,
Till earth declares you ready to break,

And you fade of the havoc her brown hands make
That are covered with mystic rings. [page 75]

STONEY LAKE

By southern seas I have seen purple stones
Throw back the shadows of the waves and hills.
On the Ægean, so the stories run,
Greek youths, with many a saffron-coloured sail,
Rode flame-like to the rhythm of the gale.

Again, on the bright shores of this small lake,
Purple of hills and pink of northern rocks.
To-day I met a sail-boat in the wind
And at its mast a brown Canadian boy—
He was as splendid as his mate of Troy. [page 76]

WHITE SLUMBER

Who has come to that farthest island
Beyond White Gull Bay?
There is a little tent among the birches
Since yesterday.
Those birches are the palest things

Even in the morning sun!
Among them the tent has suddenly blossomed,
As the white flower of a night-blooming cereus,
Silently, deep in some forest of sleep,
Might have done.

Who are they? What dreams must be theirs,
Who have found such a magical camp unawares? [page 77]

AUTUMN POOL

Even you, dark pool—
Even you feel death.
On your soft brown surface
There are deep reflections
Of a fiery breath.

To the waiting forest
Death does not come creeping
As it comes to men;
It comes shouting, waving banners,
Burning out its way with torches,

Hanging garlands now and then.
All the green walls of your silence
Hung with crimson,
Even you, dark pool—
Even you feel death.

On your soft brown surface
There are deep reflections
Of a fiery breath. [page 78]

NORTHERN GRAVEYARDS

Stony fields and lonely roads,
     Meagre hamlets, very lean,
And most prosperous graveyards
     Lying all between.

Each few miles a graveyard,

     With its crouching column,
And its urns and headstones
     Very dark and solemn.

But with what an accent,
     Yellow, purple, red,

Lie the votive offerings
     To this public dead.

Close beside the railway,
     Where the smoke drifts high,
These are decked in garlands

     For the passerby.

Even in the winter,
     Breaking through the snow
Immortelles beguile us
     As the train runs slow.

They are strangely cheerful,
     All these plots of ground
That have lost the loneliness
     Of the living. Here about

In a comradeship increasing

     Those who in their hour [page 79]
Reaped a dreary harvest,
     Missed a magic flower.

Over them the smoke-wreaths,
     Snow, or whispering grass,

And the voice of neighbours,
     Sighing as they pass;

While the urns of iron
     And the barbarous vases
Chant a willing ritual

     To forgotten faces.

So they sleep together,
     And their shades may say:
‘Wave to us, O restless traveler!
     We are glad to stay.’ [page 80]

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