Page:All quiet along the Potomac and other poems.djvu/55

Rh

Is this round moon, I see arise Up its old roadway in the skies, Over my small horizon's rim, Made by the pine wood's shadow dim, The moon that lighted Paradise?

That shone with new created beam, O'er Eden's bright quadruple stream, Over the onyx pebbles going, Or through Havilah's gold sand flowing, Under Euphrates' palms to gleam?

The moon that shone on Eve's bright hair, And cloaked with light her beauty fair, That mirrored Eve and Paradise Only in kingly Adam's eyes, Beneath a brow unlined by care?

Thy white shafts barred the dens of shade Where harmless lions crouching laid, And thornless roses lifted up, To thee and God, each incense cup Through silver altars, shadow frayed.

O new old moon! O new moon old! Hast thou no tale to mortal told Through all these years? Nay, tell me now How Eden vanished, where and how Its sinless love and sands of gold.

Tell me what lies beyond the blue, And what the whirling star-worlds do? 5