Page:The Complete Poems of Francis Ledwidge, 1919.djvu/294

288 Then, gathered all about the trees

Glad galaxies of youth are dancing,

Treading the perfume of the flowers,

Filling the hours with mazy glancing.

And when the dance is done, the trees

Are left to Peace and the brown woodpecker,

And on the western slopes of sky

The day's blue eye begins to flicker.

But at the sighing of the leaves,

When all earth grieves for lights departed

An ancient and a sad desire

Steals in to tire the human-hearted.

No fairy aid can save them now

Nor turn their prow upon the ocean,

The hundred years that missed each heart

Above them start their wheels in motion.