Madison Cawein

HERE among the beeches

Winds and wild perfume,

That the twilight pleaches

Into gleam and gloom,

Build for her a room.

Her, whose Beauty cometh,

Misty as the morn,

When the wild bee hummeth,

At its honey-horn,

In the wayside thorn.

As the wood grows dimmer,

With the drowsy night,

Like a moonbeam glimmer

Here she walks in white,

With a firefly-light.

Moths around her flitting,

Like a moth she goes;

Here a moment sitting

By this wilding rose,

With my heart’s repose.

Every bough that dances

Has assumed the grace

Of her form: and Fancies,

Flashed from eye and face,

Brood about the place.

And the water, shaken

In its plunge and poise,

To itself has taken

Quiet of her voice,

And restrains its joys.

Would that these could tell me

What and whence she is;

She, who doth enspell me,

Fill my soul with bliss

Of her spirit kiss.

Though the heart beseech her,

And the soul implore,

Who is it may reach her—

Safe behind the door

Of all woodland lore?