Page:New poems and variant readings, Stevenson, 1918.djvu/96

76 Thus one cunning in music

Wakes old chords in the memory:

Thus fair earth in the Spring leads her performances.

One more touch of the bow, smell of the virginal

Green—one more, and my bosom

Feels new life with an ecstasy.

COME, MY BELOVED, HEAR FROM ME

, my beloved, hear from me

Tales of the woods or open sea.

Let our aspiring fancy rise

A wren's flight higher toward the skies;

Or far from cities, brown and bare,

Play at the least in open air.

In all the tales men hear us tell

Still let the unfathomed ocean swell,

Or shallower forest sound abroad

Below the lonely stars of God;

In all, let something still be done,

Still in a corner shine the sun,

Slim-ankled maids be fleet of foot,

Nor man disown the rural flute,

Still let the hero from the start

In honest sweat and beats of heart

Push on along the untrodden road

For some inviolate abode.