AFOOT and light-hearted, I take to the open road,
Healthy, free, the world before me,
The long brown path before me, leading wherever I choose.
Henceforth I ask not good-fortune--I myself am good fortune;
Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing,
Strong and content, I travel the open road.
The earth--that is sufficient;
I do not want the constellations any nearer;
......
The woods decay, the woods decay and fall,
The vapours weep their burthen to the ground,
Man comes and tills the field and lies beneath,
And after many a summer dies the swan.
Me only cruel immortality
Consumes; I wither slowly in thine arms,
Here at the quiet limit of the world,
A white-hair'd shadow roaming like a dream
The ever-silent spaces of the East,
Far-folded mists, and gleaming halls of morn.
......
Misty roses, red
with pink haze, orange lilies;
Lilac promenade.
Purple pansies on the porch,
dusk soon to carry the torch.
'At last' roses, peach
chocolate cosmos, shrouded,
Yellow daisies smile.
Gardens loved to distraction,
......
I come from a musical place
Where they shoot me for my song
And my brother has been tortured
By my brother in my land.
I come from a beautiful place
Where they hate my shade of skin
They don't like the way I pray
And they ban free poetry.
......
I'll never step ashore and feel your beach
the way I felt it as a barefoot child,
or see you waver in the windy reach
of goddess-bearing sea. You were the island
Venus made with her first smile,
Zakynthos, the moment she was born.
No song embraced your leafy sky,
not even his who sang the fatal storm
and how Ulysses, his misfortunes past
and beautiful with fame, sailed home at last.
......
Misty roses, red
with pink haze, orange lilies;
Lilac promenade.
Purple pansies on the porch,
dusk soon to carry the torch.
'At last' roses, peach
chocolate cosmos, shrouded,
Yellow daisies smile.
Gardens loved to distraction,
......
in navy blue dusk
mulberry brushes green grass ~
a scene that's starlit
Little Arabella Miller lived in town, but far enough out in green country,
To watch the raspberry sun go down, and to climb a lavish, plum tree.
Arabella was seven-years-old, and had a three-year-old, baby brother;
Like the golden sunrise of promise, and unprecedented joys we discover.
Arabella Miller loved all of nature, and the myriad creatures who live it,
Like tuxedoed tits, warbling, or hide and seek chameleons, of quick exit.
Fog had lifted from Fern Valley, when favored friends came up to visit;
......
Tulips of morning
just waked from amaranth dreams,
meet glittering sun.
Dogwood rose opens redly
Pink dawn's jewel shines steady.
Beautiful flowers
respond to warmth's mute caress!
They're a dream come true
in varicolored versions
......
Violet Smith lived in Center Kingdom. Her neighbors were Jack and Jill;
Like orange sun, of a pink morning, when it's just peeking over blue hills.
With Mother and Father and sister, Ava, Violet enjoyed life on Sage farm;
Just as lilac breezes, from out of the south, only rove to keep you warm.
Theirs was a land that still believed in magic, like the red, butterfly stroll;
Or like fall trees, being crowned in colors, as summer's story grows old.
Fragrant festival days came, when fashionable, family friends, gathered,
......