e tables low,
Sheltering the reclining grace;
Here, through the curling smoke, a swarthy face,
And jewelled turban bound about the head,
And here the glow
Of red carnation pressed to lips as warmly red.

And as they lay in their luxurious ease,
Playing with grapes and rose-leaves, slim
And willowy slave-girls, in the hope to please,
Twisted and danced before them, to the dim
Uncertain music in the shadows played;
Some came with supple limb,
With Mystery's aid
And snake-like creep,
Others with riotous leap
And made festivity to Bacchus wed;
Others with stiff Egyptian tread,
And straight black hair hanging in glossy braid,
They danced, unnoted, and exhausted fled.
* * * * *
Still floated from beneath the acacia-tree
The droning Eastern music's minor key.

MCMXIII

SO prodigal was I of youth,
Forgetting I was young;
I worshipped dead men for their strength,
Forgetting I was strong.

I cherished old, jejune advice;
I thought I groped for truth;
Those dead old languages I learned
When I was prodigal of youth!

Then in the sunlight stood a boy,
Outstretching either hand,
Palm upwards, cup-like, and between
The fingers trickled sand.

"Oh, why so grave" he cried to me,
"Laugh, stern lips, laugh at last!
Let wisdom come when wisdom may.
The sand is running fast."

I followed him into the sun,
And laughed as he desired,
And every day upon the grass
We play till we are tired.

A CREED

THAT I should live and look with open eyes
I count as half my claim to Paradise.
I have not crept beneath cathedral arches,
But bathed in streams beneath the silver larches;

And have not grovelled to the Sunday priest,
But found an unconfined and daily feast;
Was called ungodly, and to those who blamed
Laughed back defiance and was not ashamed.

Some hold their duty to be mournful; why?
I cannot love your weeping poets; I
Am sad in winter, but in summer gay,
And vary with each variable day.

And though the pious cavilled at my mirth,
At least I rendered thanks for God's fair earth,
Grateful that I, among the murmuring rest,
Was not an unappreciative guest.

TO A POET
WHOSE VERSES I HAD READ

I WOULD not venture to dispraise or praise.
Too well I know the indifference which bounds
A poet in the narrow working-grounds
Where he is blind and deaf in all