That fetter and fret what the water would utter, And it rushes and splashes in tremulous trebles; It makes haste through the shallows, its soul is aflutter;

But here all the sound is serene and outspread In the murmurous moods of a slow-swirling pool; Here all the sounds are unhurried and cool; Every silence is kith to a sound; they are wed, They are mated, are mingled, are tangled, are bound; Every hush is in love with a sound, every sound By the law of its life to some silence is bound.

Then here will we hide; idle here and abide, In the covert here, close by the waterside-- Here, where the slim flattered reeds are aquiver With the exquisite hints of the reticent river, Here, where the lips of this pool are the lips Of all pools, let us listen and question and wait; Let us hark to the whispers of love and of death, Let us hark to the lispings of life and of fate-- In this place where pale silences flower into sound Let us strive for some secret of all the profound Deep and calm Silence that meshes men 'round! There's as much of God hinted in one ripple's plashes-- There's as much of Truth glints in yon dragon- fly's flight-- There's as much Purpose gleams where yonder trout flashes As in--any book else!--could we read things aright.

Then nymph of mine indolence, here let us hide, Learn, listen, and question; idle here and abide Where the rushes and lilies lean low to the tide.

"THEY HAD NO POET . . ."

"Vain was the chief's, the sage's pride! They had no poet and they died."--POPE.

By Tigris, or the streams of Ind, Ere Colchis rose, or Babylon, Forgotten empires dreamed and sinned, Setting tall towns against the dawn,

Which, when the proud Sun smote upon, Flashed fire for fire and pride for pride; Their names were . . . Ask oblivion! . . . "They had no poet, and they died."

Queens, dusk of hair and tawny-skinned, That loll where fellow leopards fawn . . . Their hearts are dust before the wind, Their loves, that shook the world, are wan!

Passion is mighty . . . but, anon, Strong Death has Romance for his bride; Their legends . . . Ask oblivion! . . . "They had no poet, and they died."

Heroes, the braggart trumps that dinned Their futile triumphs, monarch, pawn, Wild tribesmen, kingdoms disciplined, Passed like a whirlwind and were gone;

They built with bronze and gold and brawn, The inner Vision still denied; Their conquests . . . Ask oblivion! . . . "They had no poet, and they died."

Dumb oracles, and priests withdrawn, Was it but flesh they deified? Their gods were . . . Ask oblivion! . . . "They had no poet, and they died."

NEW YORK

SHE is hot to the sea that crouches beside, Human and hot to the cool stars peering down, My passionate city, my quivering town, And her dark blood, tide upon purple tide, With throbs as of thunder beats, With leaping rhythms and vast, is swirled Through the shaken lengths of her veined streets... She pulses, the heart of a world!

I have thrilled with her ecstasy, agony, woe-- Hath she a mood that I do not know? The winds of her music tumultuous have seized me and swayed me, Have lifted, have swung me around In their whorls as of cyclonic sound; Her passions have torn me and tossed me and brayed me; Drunken and tranced and dazzled with visions and gleams,

I have spun with her dervish priests; I have searched to the souls of her hunted beasts And found love sleeping there; I have soared on the wings of her flashing dreams; I have sunk with her dull despair; I have sweat with her travails and cursed with her pains; I have swelled with her foolish pride; I have raged through a thick red mist at one with her branded Cains, With her broken Christs have died.

O beautiful half-god city of visions and love!