Page:All quiet along the Potomac and other poems.djvu/269

 THE TREE OF YOUTH. 263

What knight riding down the long age,

With a blazon ashine on his crest, Ever fought such a foe as the man

Who hath smitten a sin from his breast ? Nay, what of earth s beautiful sights,

Mighty torrent or hill s misty crest, Shall be better to see, from above,

Than a mother-bird rounding her nest ?

��THE TREE OF YOUTH.

HEARD you of the tale of Ibor, Mussulman and traveller old, Who such strange, fantastic story Hath in ancient volume told,

Of the leaves for Youth s renewal Falling from the cypress tree,

Of its close concentric pathways Trodden bare by devotee ?

Where the sun of Ceylon brightens Palm and river, shore and steep,

Till its golden tissue tangles In the drowsy thicket s sleep,

High, among the tropic leafage, Spring the crown and column fair

Of the mystic, fateful cypress To the golden upper air.

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