Ah, but I have a charm to trouble you ;
A spell that shall subdue
Your all-escaping-heart, unheedful one
And unremembering!
Now, when I make my prayer
To your wild brightness there
That will but run and run,
O mindless Water! -
Hark, - now will I bring

– A grace as wild, - my little yearling daugh

ter, My Alison.

Heed well that threat ;
And tremble for your hill-born liberty
So bright to see!
Your shadow-dappled way, unthwarted yet,
And the high hills whence all your dearness

bubbled;
You, never to possess!
For let her dip but once-O fair and fleet, - -
Here in your shallows, yes,
Here in your silverness
Her two blithe feet,
O Brook of mine, how shall your heart be

troubled !

The heart, the bright unmothering heart of

you, That never knew,

(O never, more than mine of long ago.
How could we know? —)
For who should guess
The shock and smiting of that perfect-

ness ? —
The lily-thrust of those ecstatic feet
Unpityingly sweet?
Sweet beyond all the blurred blind dreams

that grope

The upward paths of hope ?
And who could guess
The dulcet holiness,
The lilt and gladness of those jocund feet,
Unpityingly sweet?
Ah, for your coolness that shall change and

stir
With every glee of her! -
Under the fresh amaze
That drips and glistens from her wiles and

ways; When the endearing air That everywhere Must twine and fold and follow her, shall be Rippled to ring on ring of melody,-Music, like shadows from the joy of her, Small starry Reveller! When from her triumphings, All frolic wings — There soars beyond the glories of the height, The laugh of her delight.

And it shall sound, until
Your heart stand still;
Shaken to human sight;
Struck through with tears and light;
One with the one desire
Unto that central Fire
Of Love the Sun, whence all we lighted are
Even from clod to star.

And all your glory, O most swift and

sweet!
And all your exultation only this;
To be the lowly and forgotten kiss
Beneath those feet.

You that must ever pass, -
You of the same wild way,-
The silver-bright good-bye without a look! -
You that would never stay,
For the beseeching grass ...
Brook!

Josephine Preston Peabody

CHILDREN'S KISSES

So; it is nightfall then.

The valley flush
That beckoned home the way for herds

and men, Is hardly spent.

Down the bright pathway winds, through veils of hush

And wonderment.

Unuttered yet, the chime
That tells of folding-time;
Hardly the sun has set.

The trees are sweetly troubled with bright words

From new-alighted birds;

And yet,

Here, round my neck, are come to cling and twine,

The arms, the folding arms, close, close and fain,

All mine!

I pleaded to, in vain,

I reached for, only to their dimpled scorning, Down the blue halls of Morning;

Athrob with joy,
There pushes here, a little golden Boy,
Still-gazing with great eyes.
And wonder-wise,
All fragrancy, all valor silver-throated,
My daughterling, my swan,
My Alison !

Closer than homing lambs against the bars At folding-time, that crowd, all mother

warm, They crowd,- they cling, they wreathe; And thick as sparkles of the thronging stars, Their kisses swarm.

O Rose of being, at whose heart I breathe,
Fold over; hold me fast
In the dark Eden of a blinding kiss.

a
And lightning heart's-desire, be still at last!
Heart can no more,
Life can no more,
Than this.

Josephine Preston Peabody

MATERNAL GRIEF

DEPARTED CHILD! I could forget thee once Though at my bosom nursed; this woeful

gain Thy dissolution brings, that in my soul