Page:Anthology of Modern Slavonic Literature in Prose and Verse by Paul Selver.djvu/293

Rh

Unwieldy black pine-stems were lying Like transparencies of the yellowish sun Upon its crinkled surface. Their bloated roots were like swarthy leeches, And wavering shadow came only to drink of it While in glory it sang and in rhythm of life

O passing winsome it was in the murk of the night, When forests were ending their song unto it, Into the moon-lit plain it poured from the hollow, How the black clattering mills seized it Craftily into their unwieldy circlings, That, grievously crushed into lissom dust, It screeched and simmered, stormily tumbling!

As if stunned, upon tip-toe, it slipped through the grass, As if stunned, softly upon tip-toe, To sorrow-girt coverts, where the silver of the moon Soldered the spare birches to their ground-plots And osiered fields in the twilit hazes.

O, was it fain to set the glorious vaultage of heaven And all creation glittering in warm tranquility, The song of the stars chanted to the Unknown. Aquiver upon its surface And glory of night ere birth of the day And its golden foot-print?

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