Page:Poems, Household Edition, Emerson, 1904.djvu/404

 THE MIRACLE

trod this path a hundred times

With idle footsteps, crooning rhymes.

I know each nest and web-worm's tent,

The fox-hole which the woodchucks rent,

Maple and oak, the old Divan

Self-planted twice, like the banian.

I know not why I came again

Unless to learn it ten times ten.

To read the sense the woods impart

You must bring the throbbing heart.

Love is aye the counterforce,—

Terror and Hope and wild Remorse,

Newest knowledge, fiery thought,

Or Duty to grand purpose wrought.

Wandering yester morn the brake,

I reached this heath beside the lake,

And oh, the wonder of the power,

The deeper secret of the hour!

Nature, the supplement of man,

His hidden sense interpret can;—

What friend to friend cannot convey

Shall the dumb bird instructed say.

Passing yonder oak, I heard

Sharp accents of my woodland bird;