And it was for this that they endured this gloom; This October like November, That August like a hundred thousand hours, And that September, A hundred thousand dragging sunlit days And half October like a thousand years.... Oh, poor dears!
They threw a stone, you threw a stone, I threw a stone that day. Although their sharpness bruised his flesh He had no word to say.
But for the moan he did not make To-day I make my moan; And for the stone I threw at him My heart must bear a stone.
Lady, your heart has turned to dust, Your wail is taken by the sea. The wind is knocking at my heart, And will not let me be.
Your moaning smites me in my dreams, And I must sorrow till I die. And I shall rove, and I shall weep, Till in the grave I lie.
My son is dead and I am going blind, And in the Ishmael-wind of grief I tremble like a leaf; I have no mind for any word you say: My son is dead and I am going blind.
The pale day drowses on the western steep; The toiler faints along the marge of sleep Within the sunset-press, incarnadine, The sun, a peasant, tramples out his wine.
Ah, scattered gold rests on the twilight streams; The poppy opes her scarlet purse of dreams. Night with the sickle-moon engarners wheat, And binds the sheaves of stars beneath her feet.
Rest, weary heart, and every flight-worn bird! The brooklet of the meadow lies unstirred. Sleep, every soul, against a comrade breast! God grant you peace, and guard you in your rest!
This is the song of youth, This is the cause of myself; I knew my father well and he was a fool, Therefore will I have my own foot in the path before I take a step;
I will go only into new lands, And I will walk on no plank-walks. The horses of my family are wind-broken, And the dogs are old, And the guns rusty; I will make me a new bow from an ash-tree, And cut up the homestead into arrows.
Behold how people stand around! (There are always crowds of people standing around, Whose legs have no knees)— While the engineers put up steel work ... Is it something to catch the sunlight, Jewelry and gew-gaw? I have no time to wait for them to build bridges for me; Where awful the gap seems stretching there is no gap, Leaping I take it at once from a thought to a thought. I can no more walk in the stride of other men Than be father of their children.