Page:Poetry, a magazine of verse, Volume 7 (October 1915-March 1916).djvu/233

To Nak-Ku Thy lips draw me Like morning's flame on a song-bird's wing. I follow—but thy kiss is denied. I am a hunter alone in a forest of silence. Under what bough Are the warm wings of thy kiss folded?


 * Amid the scent of berries drying

From my high roof I have seen the dusky sea Trip rustlingly along the sand-floors, In little moccasins of silver, moon-broidered with shells of longing. Ah, thy little moccasins, Nak-Ku! But thy feet recede from me like ebbing tides.


 * I have closed my door:

The heavy cedar-blanket hangs before it. Since thou comest not, Better that my narrow pine couch seem wide as a winter field. The moon makes silver shadows on my floor through the poplars. The wind rustles the leaves, Swaying the boughs o'er the smoke-hole; The little silver shadows run toward my couch— Ah-hi, Nak-Ku!


 * I hear the pattering of women on the sand-paths:

Fluttered laughs, bird-whisperings before my lodge— "Oh lover, lover!"