The Complete Works of L M Montgomery

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The Complete Works of L M Montgomery Page 768

by L. M. Montgomery


  And the buttercups are rhyming all their golden fairy lore.

  Here is always balm and healing for a world-worn, weary heart,

  Nature’s hieroglyphic message that the centuries have conned;

  Not a hint is here of striving or the turmoil of the mart —

  Just a world of rest and beauty in the pasture by the pond!

  Drought

  So long it is since kindly rain

  Fell on the thirsty meadow lands;

  The birds forget their old refrain;

  The trees uplift their pleading hands

  To hard bright skies that do not heed,

  But arch above the valley dim,

  And touch the far hill’s burning rim,

  And care not for our mighty need.

  Athwart the dusty highway’s glare

  The wan white daisies, drooping, lean;

  The roses faint in their despair

  On pasture slopes no longer green;

  The plaintive brooks have ceased to pray,

  Unfed by springs whose lips are dry,

  And the dull evening in the sky

  Shuts out the brazen edge of day.

  Great Father, listen to our prayer,

  And send on us Thy gracious rain

  To hush the moan of our despair

  And drown the memory of our pain;

  Then all the hills to Thee will raise

  A psalm of utter thankfulness;

  Thy name each thirsty blossom bless,

  And every meadow hymn Thy praise.

  After Drought

  Last night all through the darkling hours we heard

  The voices of the rain,

  And every languid pulse in nature stirred

  Responsive to the strain;

  The morning brought a breath of strong sweet air

  From shadowy pinelands blown,

  And over field and upland everywhere

  A new-born greenness shone.

  The saintly meadow lilies offer up

  Their white hearts to the sun,

  And every wildwood blossom lifts its cup

  With incense overrun;

  The brook whose voice was silent yestereve

  Now sings its old refrain,

  And all the world is grateful to receive

  The blessing of the rain.

  Rain In The Country

  Here in the country the cool sweet rain

  Falls on the daisies and growing grain,

  Shadows the pond with widening rings,

  Kisses the lips of the lowland springs,

  Plays with the pines on the hill-top dim

  And fills the valley with mist abrim.

  It splashes in shadowy forest nooks,

  Dimples the faces of woodland brooks,

  Whispers with leaves in untrodden ways,

  Wraps the distance in sober grays,

  Dances o’er meadows of lushest green

  And scatters the petals where roses lean.

  The Tree Lovers

  They grew in the fringe of woodland at the foot of the

  homestead hill,

  Where ran like a silver ribbon a dimpling summer rill —

  A spruce and a leafy maple — so close together they grew

  That hardly a lance of sunlight might pierce their greenness through.

  Their mingled branches swaying cast ever a cooling shade

  O’er the strip of emerald grassland where the happy children played,

  And a slender lad and thoughtful, with dreamy eyes of blue,

  Said the tree was a maple maiden and the spruce her lover true.

  The fancy pleased the children, as fancies children will,

  For it gave them a sense of friendship with the trees below the hill:

  As if the spruce and the maple had a life to their own akin,

  And beneath their bark imprisoned beat human hearts within.

  They saw how the maple nestled to the spruce’s sheltering side,

  As his rugged green arms clasped her with fond protecting pride.

  He was the taller and stronger; she the more graceful tree,

  And never could human lovers more kind and faithful be.

  When the winter snows were silver, and the winter winds were keen,

  The gray-cloaked bride was leafless but the sturdy spruce was green;

  And when the springtime rapture thrilled all the woodlands through,

  The tender tints of maple were blent with his somber hue.

  All through the days of summer they talked and whispered low,

  While the gentle west-winds wavered their branches to and fro;

  And in autumn the little maple, in her splendor of crimson gay,

  Stood proudly close to her lover in his rugged and dark array.

  The children have grown and wandered from the ken of the

  homestead hill,

  But the trees through seasons many are green and faithful still.

  Still nestles the little maple to her knightly lover’s side,

  And still the spruce-tree shelters with his mighty arms his bride,

  Though the winter winds are biting, but the closer drawn are they,

  As fond as when summer sunbeams among their branches play:

  Time passes o’er them as lightly as it does o’er the ribbon rill,

  There, as each season passes, at the foot of the homestead hill.

  In Untrod Woods

  Lonely, think you, this deep unbroken hush,

  Unstirred save by leaf-murmurs or the rush

  Of fitful winds on-sweeping?

  Nay, nay, not so! You have not learned the store

  Of deep enchantment that forever more

  These untrod woods are keeping.

  They are not voiceless — in the night and day

  Wood-whispers creep around and wood-winds stray

  In mossy beechen alleys,

  And dusking pines are crooning evermore

  Their mysteries of half-forgotten lore

  In sunlight-threaded valleys.

  Slim birches lean o’er many a clear spring’s heart,

  As maidens viewing by themselves apart

  Their lissome charms reflected —

  Now steals the chime of water murmurings,

  And now some unseen woodbird’s rondel sings,

  As sweet as unexpected.

  The woods are never lonely, as I stray

  Adown rain-freshened slopes I hear today

  All shy blithe forest voices,

  Calling around me till the great wood’s calm

  Falls on my spirit with a wondrous balm,

  And my vexed heart rejoices.

  The Wild Places

  Oh, here is joy that cannot be

  In any market bought or sold,

  Where forests beckon fold on fold

  In a pale silver ecstasy,

  And every hemlock is a spire

  Of faint moon-fire.

  For music we shall have the chill

  Wild bugle of a vagrant wind

  Seeking for what it cannot find,

  A lonely trumpet on the hill,

  Or keening in the dear dim white

  Chambers of night.

  And there are colours in the wild:

  The royal purple of old kings;

  Rose-fire of secret dawn; clear springs

  Of emerald in valleys aisled

  With red pine stems; and tawny stir

  Of dying fir.

  And we shall know as lovers do

  The wooing rain, the eternal lure

  Of tricksy brook and beckoning moor,

  The hidden laughters that pursue,

  As if the gods of elder day

  Were here at play.

  For these wild places hold their own

  Boon myths of faun and goblin still,

  And have a lingering good-will

  For folk in green if truth were known;

  Oh, what an old delightful fear — />
  Hush, listen, hear!

  A Perfect Day

  A day came up this morning o’er the sea —

  Dawn-eyed and virgin from an orient shore —

  And dear were the delights it brought to me,

  Dearer than any day had given before:

  ’Tis with sweet sorrow at the sunset bell

  I bid my day farewell.

  For never, as I think, was light so fair

  On the green waves, and never rang so clear

  The haunting elfin music of the air,

  And never fell so subtly on the ear

  The antic pipes of freakish winds astir

  In bosky glens of fir.

  The roses bloomed as if they only had

  One day of all the year on which to bloom,

  And, bent on making wild and garden glad,

  Flung forth their long upgathering of perfume;

  It seemed to me that every dappled hour

  Burst into lavish flower.

  Then when the sunset came the rainbow west

  Was splendid, as if all days fair and good

  Were at its portal to receive as guest

  My day into their purple sisterhood,

  Crowning it on the ancient hills afar

  With an immortal star.

  Forever shall it be a lyric page

  Of verse ambrosial, to be often conned,

  Holding its treasure safe from touch of age

  Forever kept in a remembrance fond:

  For this my day that came across the sea

  Brought heart’s desire to me!

  Requiem

  Tonight, when the twilight fell,

  Died the beautiful Day!

  On the far dim hills she lay,

  With her garland of asphodel —

  Ring, wild winds, her knell.

  Gems in her long dark hair

  Scattered the kindly Night;

  Over her bier the white

  Clear stars are watching there —

  Oh, the dead Day is fair!

  Fair was she when she stood

  Poised on the hills of dawn,

  While their radiance over her shone

  In the blithesome laughing mood

  Of her mirthful maidenhood.

  Fair was she then. Ah fair!

  But fairer is she now

  With the awful peace on her brow,

  That only the dead may wear,

  And the starlight on her hair.

  Let us take our last farewell

  Of the beautiful calm-lipped Day,

  Ere the Night will hide her away

  With a star for sentinel —

  Ring, wild winds, her knell.

  In Twilight Fields

  O’er dewy meadows, dim and gray,

  There comes a breath of balm,

  And wilding slopes of far away

  Are wrapped in pensive calm;

  Afar the lustrous skies are deep,

  And crystal planets shine,

  Where roaming winds have dropped asleep

  Among the hills of pine.

  The daisies float above the grass,

  Like spirits of the dew,

  And low sweet voices faintly pass

  The lush green thickets through.

  Slow fades the mellow sunset light;

  The dusker shadows creep;

  Beneath the soothing touch of night

  The world has found its sleep.

  No echoes of the troubled day

  Can stir this wondrous hour;

  Noon’s feverish breath is far away,

  And care has lost its power.

  Lulled on her broad maternal breast,

  Our kind earth mother yields

  A deep untainted peace and rest

  In tranquil twilight fields.

  Twilight In Abegweit

  A filmy western sky of smoky red,

  Blossoming into stars above a sea

  Of soft mysterious dim silver spread

  Beyond the long gray dunes’ serenity:

  Where the salt grasses and sea poppies press

  Together in a wild sweet loneliness.

  Seven slim poplars on the windy hill

  Talk some lost language of an elder day,

  Taught by the green folk that inhabit still

  The daisied field and secret friendly way —

  Forever keeping in their solitudes

  The magic ritual of our northern woods.

  The darkness woos us like a perfumed flower

  To reedy meadow pool and wise old trees,

  To beds of spices in a garden bower,

  And the spruce valley’s dear austerities;

  I know their lure of dusk, but evermore

  I turn to the enchantment of the shore.

  The idle ships dream-like at anchor ride,

  Beside the pier where wavelets lap and croon;

  One ghostly ship sails outward with the tide

  That swells to meet the pale imperial moon,

  O — fading ship, between the dark and light,

  I send my heart and hope with you tonight.

  Night In The Pastures

  The night wind steals from the tranquil hills,

  And its noiseless footsteps pass

  O’er the dim hushed breadths of the pasture fields,

  And the dew-wet trampled grass.

  The stars are thick in the velvet sky,

  Where a white young moon shines clear

  Through the airy boughs of the poplars tall,

  And the peace of the night is here.

  The brook’s soft gurgle is sweet and low,

  And the sorrowful whip-poor-wills

  Are grieving afar in the purple gloom

  Of the dark encircling hills;

  And the faint weird murmurs of elfin things

  Through the shadowy pine-trees creep,

  But the air is sweet with the hush of dreams,

  And the fields have gone to sleep.

  The placid cattle have laid them down

  At the roots of the mystic firs,

  And the sheep in the lowland are dimly white

  Where the wind in the bracken stirs.

  The hills are chanting a solemn hymn

  At the altar of star and sky;

  In a rapturous silence, a dim-lit calm,

  The dewy pastures lie.

  Here, in these meadows of starry rest,

  In these mysteries of the night,

  The manifold voices of Nature breathe

  With a meaning of strange delight.

  The passionless calm of the dreaming fields

  Has the power of a holy prayer,

  And the infinite love of the far dim hills

  Shuts out every thought of care.

  Night

  A pale enchanted moon is sinking low

  Behind the dunes that fringe the shadowy lea,

  And there is haunted starlight on the flow

  Of immemorial sea.

  I am alone and need no more pretend

  Laughter or smile to hide a hungry heart;

  I walk with solitude as with a friend

  Enfolded and apart.

  We tread an eerie road across the moor

  Where shadows weave upon their ghostly looms,

  And winds sing an old lyric that might lure

  Sad queens from ancient tombs.

  I am a sister to the loveliness

  Of cool far hill and long-remembered shore,

  Finding in it a sweet forgetfulness

  Of all that hurt before.

  The world of day, its bitterness and cark,

  No longer have the power to make me weep;

  I welcome this communion of the dark

  As toilers welcome sleep.

  Oh, it is well to waken with the woods

  And feel, as those who wait with God alone,

  The forest’s heart in these rare solitudes

  Beating against our own.

&n
bsp; Close-shut behind us are the gates of care,

  Divinity enfolds us, prone to bless,

  And our souls kneel. Night in the wilderness

  Is one great prayer.

  On The Gulf Shore

  Lap softly on the curving shore

  Where sandpeeps leave their footprints small;

  Lap softly, purple waves, where o’er

  The gleaming sand the ripples fall.

  Aloft the sky is blue; the clouds

  Are soft and white above the sea;

  The seagulls fly in snowy crowds;

  The boats are floating lazily.

  Then lap, lap softly, purple waves!

  No tempests toss your crests today —

  Your azure dimples are the graves

  Where millions buried sunbeams play.

  The curving dunes are golden brown;

  The shore-grass nods its slender head;

  The hot white sand sifts slowly down,

  Or slips beneath our hasty tread

  Far runs the shore, a silver strand,

  And skies meet seas in clouds of pearl;

  The ocean’s arms embrace the land,

  And far aloft the swallows whirl.

  Then lap, lap softly, on the shore,

  Blue waters, lap! I rest and dream

  Of ships that sail your surface o’er

  And watch the shifting sunshine gleam.

  Sail onward, ships! White wings, sail on,

  Till past the horizon’s purple bar

  You drift from sight! In flush of dawn

  Sail on, and, ‘neath the evening star,

  Fair skies be o’er you! Fair winds fill

  Your swelling sails, till half the world

  Be circled, and, in havens still,

  Your weary wings be calmly furled.

  Swoop, seagulls, swoop above the blue,

  Nor fold till eve your pinions’ snow!

  Where sleep you, seagulls, when the dew

  Dampens the sand and moons outglow?

  Lap softly, purple waves! I dream,

  And dreams are sweet. I’ll wake no more,

  But ever watch the white sails gleam,

  And plovers flit along the shore!

  When The Tide Goes Out

  The boats sail out over murmurous seas,

  O’er reaches of dazzling blue,

  Past islands like purple Hesperides

  Whence at dawn the sea-gulls flew;

  Their white sails glisten in galaxies,

  When the tide goes out.

  Afar, where the sky bends down to meet

 

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