Classic Poem

Rosy belief uplifts her spires
Anemone-frail in amaranth air
That never hurts a thing:
This river's highway leads us there,
Hear how each crystal crisped spring
Comes lightfoot down from shepherd shires,
Comes past the stones and roots and briars
To journey with this king.
And Honesty on his boat with bales
And bags and barrels laded sails;
The merry wind knows that white wing!
He sees those steeples, and he hails;
And we'll go journeying there.
You must be by me, then be gone,
Then through the bush peep like a bird,
And then with arm in mine step on,
And like one in a legend sing,
Or play with an angel word.
The silver bream jumps out of the stream,
Morn's diamonds ding from the blackbird's wing,
And through long glades that gilt wing speeds—
We'll go where this green river leads
And prismy light and bowing reeds
To that sweet town,
With lilies lulled, to that sweet town
Whose airiest tiptoe chanticleer
Gleams on the west wind all the year;
Belief's our mark, we've crossed the down,
Time brought the eagle—now the dove!
And there's her sparkling belvedere—
Come, my late and early love.