ill not change a song
If the bird has a golden crest;
No feathers of blue and rose-red
Could make a song.
I have known in my dreaming
A gray bird that sang
While all the fields listened!
The Bird of Paradise is like flowers of many trees
Blooming on one:
I saw him in the meadow,
But it was the gray bird I heard singing
Beyond and far.

SHINY BROOK

Oh, shiny brook,
I watch you on your way to the sea,
And see little faces peering up
Out of the water . . .
Water-fairies
Strange smiles and questions.
They are your pebbles sweet,
Golden with foam of the sun,
Blue with foam of the sky.
I know their way of speaking,
Of talking to each other:
I hear them telling secrets
About green moss, about fish that get lost.
And how I am sitting on a big stone
Getting my feet wet in Shiny Brook
To watch their surprising ways!

HILLS

The hills are going somewhere;
They have been on the way a long time.
They are like camels in a line
But they move more slowly.
Sometimes at sunset they carry silks,
But most of the time silver birch trees,
Heavy rocks, heavy trees, gold leaves
On heavy branches till they are aching . . .
Birches like silver bars they can hardly lift
With grass so thick about their feet to hinder . . .
They have not gone far
In the time I've watched them . . .

ADVENTURE

I went slowly through the wood of shadows,
Thinking always I should meet some one:
There was no one.

I found a hollow
Sweet to rest in all night long:
I did not stay.

I came out beyond the trees
To the moaning sea.
Over the sea swam a cloud the outline of a ship:
What if that ship held my adventure
Under its sails?

Come quickly to me, come quickly,
I am waiting.
I am here on the sand;
Sail close!
I want to go over the waves . . .
The sand holds me back.
Oh adventure, if you belong to me,
Don't blow away down the sky!

FAIRIES

I cannot see fairies.
I dream them.
There is no fairy can hide from me;
I keep on dreaming till I find him:
There you are, Primrose! I see you, Black Wing!

HUMMING-BIRD

Why do you stand on the air
And no sun shining?
How can you h