As come the white sails of ships
  O’er the ocean’s verge;
As comes the smile to the lips,
  The foam to the surge;

So come to the Poet his songs,
  All hitherward blown
From the misty realm, that belongs
  To the vast unknown.

His, and not his, are the lays
  He sings; and their fame
Is his, and not his; and the praise
  And the pride of a name.

For voices pursue him by day,
  And haunt him by night,
And he listens, and needs must obey,
  When the Angel says:  “Write!”

***********

IN THE HARBOR

BECALMED

Becalmed upon the sea of Thought,
Still unattained the land it sought,
My mind, with loosely-hanging sails,
Lies waiting the auspicious gales.

On either side, behind, before,
The ocean stretches like a floor,—­
A level floor of amethyst,
Crowned by a golden dome of mist.

Blow, breath of inspiration, blow! 
Shake and uplift this golden glow! 
And fill the canvas of the mind
With wafts of thy celestial wind.

Blow, breath of song! until I feel
The straining sail, the lifting keel,
The life of the awakening sea,
Its motion and its mystery!

THE POET’S CALENDAR

JANUARY

Janus am I; oldest of potentates;
  Forward I look, and backward, and below
I count, as god of avenues and gates,
  The years that through my portals come and go. 
I block the roads, and drift the fields with snow;
I chase the wild-fowl from the frozen fen;
My frosts congeal the rivers in their flow,
My fires light up the hearths and hearts of men.

FEBRUARY

I am lustration, and the sea is mine. 
  I wash the sands and headlands with my tide;
My brow is crowned with branches of the pine;
  Before my chariot-wheels the fishes glide. 
By me all things unclean are purified,
  By me the souls of men washed white again;
E’en the unlovely tombs of those who died
  Without a dirge, I cleanse from every stain.

MARCH

I Martius am!  Once first, and now the third! 
  To lead the Year was my appointed place;
A mortal dispossessed me by a word,
  And set there Janus with the double face. 
Hence I make war on all the human race;
  I shake the cities with my hurricanes;
I flood the rivers and their banks efface,
  And drown the farms and hamlets with my rains.

APRIL

I open wide the portals of the Spring
  To welcome the procession of the flowers,
With their gay banners, and the birds that sing
  Their song of songs from their aerial towers. 
I soften with my sunshine and my showers
  The heart of earth; with thoughts of love I glide
Into the hearts of men; and with the Hours
  Upon the Bull with wreathed horns I ride.