HE AND I

Just drifting on together—­
        He and I—­
As through the balmy weather
        Of July
  Drift two thistle-tufts imbedded
  Each in each—­by zephyrs wedded—­
  Touring upward, giddy-headed,
        For the sky.

And, veering up and onward,
        Do we seem
Forever drifting dawnward
        In a dream,
  Where we meet song-birds that know us,
  And the winds their kisses blow us,
  While the years flow far below us
        Like a stream.

And we are happy—­very—­
        He and I—­
Aye, even glad and merry
        Though on high
  The heavens are sometimes shrouded
  By the midnight storm, and clouded
  Till the pallid moon is crowded
        From the sky.

My spirit ne’er expresses
        Any choice
But to clothe him with caresses
        And rejoice;
  And as he laughs, it is in
  Such a tone the moonbeams glisten
  And the stars come out to listen
        To his voice.

And so, whate’er the weather,
        He and I,—­
With our lives linked thus together,
        Float and fly
  As two thistle-tufts imbedded
  Each in each—­by zephyrs wedded—­
  Touring upward, giddy-headed,
        For the sky.

[Illustration:  (HE AND I)]

[Illustration:  (THE LOST PATH—­TITLE)]

THE LOST PATH

Alone they walked—­their fingers knit together,
  And swaying listlessly as might a swing
Wherein Dan Cupid dangled in the weather
  Of some sun-flooded afternoon of Spring.

Within the clover-fields the tickled cricket
  Laughed lightly as they loitered down the lane,
And from the covert of the hazel-thicket
  The squirrel peeped and laughed at them again.

The bumble-bee that tipped the lily-vases
  Along the road-side in the shadows dim,
Went following the blossoms of their faces
  As though their sweets must needs be shared with him.

Between the pasture bars the wondering cattle
  Stared wistfully, and from their mellow bells
Shook out a welcoming whose dreamy rattle
  Fell swooningly away in faint farewells.

And though at last the gloom of night fell o’er them
  And folded all the landscape from their eyes,
They only know the dusky path before them
  Was leading safely on to Paradise.

[Illustration:  (THE LOST PATH)]

MY BRIDE THAT IS TO BE

O soul of mine, look out and see
  My bride, my bride that is to be! 
  Reach out with mad, impatient hands,
And draw aside futurity
As one might draw a veil aside—­
  And so unveil her where she stands
Madonna-like and glorified—­
  The queen of undiscovered lands
Of love, to where she beckons me—­
My bride—­my bride that is to be.