Sends Nature forth the daughter of the skies... To dance on earth, and charm all human eyes.

There was intoxication in the air;
The wind, keen blowing from across the seas,
O'er leagues of new-ploughed land and heathery leas,
Smelt of wild gorse whose gold flamed everywhere.
And undertone of song pulsed far and near,
The soaring larks filled heaven with ecstasies,
And, like a living clock among the trees,
The shouting cuckoo struck the time of year.
For now the Sun had found the earth once more,
And woke the Sleeping Beauty with a kiss;
Who thrilled with light of love in every pore,
Opened her flower-blue eyes, and looked in his.
Then all things felt life fluttering at their core—
The world shook mystical in lambent bliss.

See mother earth her offspring's fate bemoan, And nations gaze at scenes before unknown! See the bright beams of heaven's revolving light Involved in sorrows and the veil of night! The goddess comes, she moves divinely fair,

How the earth sings as it spins!/Sings the lightness of its flight,/its freedom, its grace, its joy.

As Spring rain softens the Earth with surprise
May your Winter places be kissed by light.

As the ocean dreams to the joy of dance
May the grace of change bring you elegance.

As day anchors a tree in light and wind
May your outer life grow from peace within.

As twilight fills night with bright horizons
May Beauty await you at home beyond.

Lines for My Daughter

With reverence for the earth you venture
into vague margins of advancing rain
and behold crystals of the sailing sun.

The clouds weave ribbons of shade and eclipse,
rippling on the colors that compose you,
sand, sienna, jade, the speckled turquoise

of mountain skies. And in your supple mind
there are shaped the legends of creation,
and in them you appear as dawn appears,

beautiful in the whispers of the wind,
whole among the soft syllables of myth
and the rhythms of serpentine rivers.

Once more you venture. The long days darken
In the wake of your going, and thunder
Rolls, bearing you across a ridge of dreams.

I follow on the drifts of sweetgrass and smoke,
On a meadow path of pollen I walk,
And hold fast the great gift of your being.

And her heart sprang in Iseult, and she drew
With all her spirit and life the sunrise through
And through her lips the keen triumphant air
Sea-scented, sweeter than land-roses were,
And through her eyes the whole rejoicing east
Sun-satisfied, and all the heaven at feast
Spread for the morning; and the imperious mirth
Of wind and light that moved upon the earth,
Making the spring, and all the fruitful might
And strong regeneration of delight
That swells the seedling leaf and sapling man,
Since the first life in the first world began
To burn and burgeon through void limbs and veins,
And the first love with sharp sweet procreant pains
To pierce and bring forth roses; yea, she felt
Through her own soul the sovereign morning melt,
And all the sacred passion of the sun;
And as the young clouds flamed and were undone
About him coming, touched and burnt away
In rosy ruin and yellow spoil of day,
The sweet veil of her body and corporal sense
Felt the dawn also cleave it, and incense
With light from inward and with effluent heat
The kindling soul through fleshly hands and feet.
And as the august great blossom of the dawn
Burst, and the full sun scarce from sea withdrawn
Seemed on the fiery water a flower afloat,
So as a fire the mighty morning smote
Throughout her, and incensed with the influent hour
Her whole soul's one great mystical red flower
Burst, and the bud of her sweet spirit broke
Rose-fashion, and the strong spring at a stroke
Thrilled, and was cloven, and from the full sheath came
The whole rose of the woman red as flame:
And all her Mayday blood as from a swoon
Flushed, and May rose up in her and was June.
So for a space her hearth as heavenward burned:
Then with half summer in her eyes she turned,
And on her lips was April yet, and smiled,
As though the spirit and sense unreconciled
Shrank laughing back, and would not ere its hour
Let life put forth the irrevocable flower.
And the soft speech between them grew again