leaves;
The crystal splash of summer rain,
Saturate with the odours of the sod.

With alert fingers I listen
To the showers of sound
That the wind shakes from the forest.
I bathe in the liquid shade
Under the pines, where the air hangs cool
After the shower is done.
My saucy little friend the squirrel
Flips my shoulder with his tail,
Leaps from leafy billow to leafy billow,
Returns to eat his breakfast from my hand.
Between us there is glad sympathy;
He gambols; my pulses dance;
I am exultingly full of the joy of life!

Have not my fingers split the sand
On the sun-flooded beach?
Hath not my naked body felt the water sing
When the sea hath enveloped it
With rippling music?
Have I not felt
The lilt of waves beneath my boat,
The flap of sail,
The strain of mast,
The wild rush
Of the lightning-charged winds?
Have I not smelt the swift, keen flight
Of winged odours before the tempest?
Here is joy awake, aglow;
Here is the tumult of the heart.

My hands evoke sight and sound out of feeling,
Intershifting the senses endlessly;
Linking motion with sight, odour with sound
They give colour to the honeyed breeze,
The measure and passion of a symphony
To the beat and quiver of unseen wings.
In the secrets of earth and sun and air
My fingers are wise;
They snatch light out of darkness,
They thrill to harmonies breathed in silence.

I walked in the stillness of the night,
And my soul uttered her gladness.
O Night, still, odorous Night, I love thee!
O wide, spacious Night, I love thee!
O steadfast, glorious Night!
I touch thee with my hands;
I lean against thy strength;
I am comforted.

O fathomless, soothing Night!
Thou art a balm to my restless spirit,
I nestle gratefully in thy bosom,
Dark, gracious mother!
Like a dove, I rest in thy bosom.
_Out of the uncharted, unthinkable dark we came,
And in a little time we shall return again
Into the vast, unanswering