Part 9

El Extraviado

Over the radiant ridges borne out on the offshore wind, I have sailed as a butterfly sails whose priming wings unfurled Leave the familiar gardens and visited fields behind To follow a cloud in the east rose-flushed on the rim of the world.

I have strayed from the trodden highway for walking with upturned eyes On the way of the wind in the treetops, and the drift of the tinted rack. For the will to be losing no wonder of sunny or starlit skies I have chosen the sod for my pillow and a threadbare coat for my back.

Evening of ample horizons, opaline, delicate, pure, Shadow of clouds on green valleys, trailed over meadows and trees, Cities of ardent adventure where the harvests of Joy mature, Forests whose murmuring voices are amorous prophecies,

World of romance and profusion, still round my journey spread The glamours, the glints, the enthralments, the nurture of one whose feet From hours unblessed by beauty nor lighted by love have fled As the shade of the tomb on his pathway and the scent of the winding-sheet.

I never could rest from roving nor put from my heart this need To be seeing how lovably Nature in flower and face hath wrought, -- In flower and meadow and mountain and heaven where the white clouds breed And the cunning of silken meshes where the heart's desire lies caught.

Over the azure expanses, on the offshore breezes borne, I have sailed as a butterfly sails, nor recked where the impulse led, Sufficed with the sunshine and freedom, the warmth and the summer morn, The infinite glory surrounding, the infinite blue ahead.

La Nue

Oft when sweet music undulated round, Like the full moon out of a perfumed sea Thine image from the waves of blissful sound Rose and thy sudden light illumined me.

And in the country, leaf and flower and air Would alter and the eternal shape emerge; Because they spoke of thee the fields seemed fair, And Joy to wait at the horizon's verge.

The little cloud-gaps in the east that filled Gray afternoons with bits of tenderest blue Were windows in a palace pearly-silled That thy voluptuous traits came glimmering through.

And in the city, dominant desire For which men toil within its prison-bars, I watched thy white feet moving in the mire And thy white forehead hid among the stars.

Mystical, feminine, provoking, nude, Radiant there with rosy arms outspread, Sum of fulfillment, sovereign attitude, Sensual with laughing lips and thrown-back head,

Draped in the rainbow on the summer hills, Hidden in sea-mist down the hot coast-line, Couched on the clouds that fiery sunset fills, Blessed, remote, impersonal, divine;

The gold all color and grace are folded o'er, The warmth all beauty and tenderness embower, -- Thou quiverest at Nature's perfumed core, The pistil of a myriad-petalled flower.

Round thee revolves, illimitably wide, The world's desire, as stars around their pole. Round thee all earthly loveliness beside Is but the radiate, infinite aureole.

Thou art the poem on the cosmic page -- In rubric written on its golden ground -- That Nature paints her flowers and foliage And rich-illumined commentary round.

Thou art the rose that the world's smiles and tears Hover about like butterflies and bees. Thou art the theme the music of the spheres Echoes in endless, variant harmonies.

Thou art the idol in the altar-niche Faced by Love's congregated worshippers, Thou art the holy sacrament round which The vast cathedral is the universe.

Thou art the secret in the crystal where, For the last light upon the mystery Man, In his lone tower and ultimate despair, Searched the gray-bearded Zoroastrian.

And soft and warm as in the magic sphere, Deep-orbed as in its erubescent fire, So in my heart thine image would appear, Curled round with the red flames of my desire.

All That's Not Love . . .

All that's not love is the dearth of my days, The leaves of the volume with rubric unwrit, The temple in times without prayer, without praise, The altar unset and the candle unlit.

Let me survive not the lovable sway Of early desire, nor see when it goes The courts of Life's abbey in ivied decay, Whence sometime sweet anthems and incense arose.

The delicate hues of its sevenfold rings The rainbow outlives not; their yellow and blue The butterfly sees not dissolve from his wings, But even with their beauty life fades from them too.

No more would I linger past Love's ardent bounds Nor live for aught else but the joy that it craves, That, burden and essence of all that surrounds, Is the song in the wind and the smile on the waves.

Paris

First, London, for its myriads; for its height, Manhattan heaped in towering stalagmite; But Paris for the smoothness of the paths That lead the heart unto the heart's delight. . . .