E. Merrill Root

THIS is our world: a dark stream murmuring;

Sly hordes of shadows out of every brake;

Sky-fallen gold-fish stars that float or shake

In mirrored nets these wizard maples fling;

My oars, that dip like some light swallow’s wing;

Fire-flies, like sparks that the wind fans awake;

And moments like the bubbles that we make,

Like the frail foam that marks our voyaging!

Love, let us drift—what matter when or where?

Are not the stars, the dusk, the whispering stream,

Far whippoorwills, our boat, and we, a dream

In some mad mind? And do not all streams bear

Themselves and all they hold to one vast sea—

The waste wan waters of Eternity?