Classic Poem

The heron rises and circles;
The wild duck steadily flies
Past the shadowy lake and marshes
Toward the yellow western skies.

The ripples murmur and travel
Outward in golden lines.
A wild duck flaps from the marshes
And rises over the pines.

Shadows sink on the woodland
Mistily deepening more.
A wild duck flies toward the sunset.
A wild duck lifts from the shore.

I am lone in this land of marshes;
I wander its silent streams,
Where I hear but the wild duck calling
And see but the yellow gleams.

Dark comes on the quiet waters.
The pine-trees sink in haze.
Only the west is lighted
With ruin of many days.

Only the rushes murmur
On the water's mirror breast,
As a wild duck hovers, and turns him
Toward the open silent west.