summer days it dreams old dreams
Of far-off southern forests, and the sighing
Of wind-blown boughs above bird-haunted streams;
But when the storm sets the white spindrift flying
It thrills and trembles with the old unrest,
And shakes the wild-rose petals from its breast.

THE LACE-MAKER OF BRUGES

Her age-worn hands upon her apron lie
Idle and still. Against the sunset glow
Tall poplars stand, and silent barges go
Along the green canal that wanders by.
A lean, red finger pointing to the sky,
The spire of Notre Dame. Above a row
Of dim, gray arches where the sunbeams die,
The ancient belfry guards the square below.

One August eve she stood in that same square
And gazed and listened, proud beneath her tears,
To see her soldier passing down the street.
To-night the beat of drums and trumpets' blare
With bursts of fiendish music smite her ears,
And mingle with the tread of trampling feet.

AUGUST, 1915.

RHEIMS

In royal splendour rose the house of prayer,
Its mystic gloom arched over by the flight
Of soaring vault; above the nave's dim night
Rich gleamed the painted windows wondrous fair.
Sweet chimes and chanting mingled in the air;
Blue clouds of incense dimmed the vaulted height;
And on the altar, like a beacon light,
The gold cross glittered in the candles' glare.

To-day no bells, no choirs, no incense cloud,
For thou, O Rheims art prey of evil powers;
But with a voice a thousand times more loud
Than siege-guns echoing round thy shattered towers,
Do thy mute bells to all the world proclaim
Thy martyred glory and thy foeman's shame.

JUNE, 1916.

CALVARY

The women stood and watched while thick, black night
Enclosed the awful tragedy. Afar
Three crosses stood, against a single bar
Of crimson-glowing, black-encircled light.
No hint of Easter dawn. In all the height
Of that dark heaven, not a single star
To whisper;—Love and Life the victors are.
It seemed to them that wrong had conquered right.

O ye who watch and wait, the night is long.
A curtain of spun fire and woven gloom
Across the mighty tragedy is drawn.
But soon your ears shall hear a triumph song,
And golden light shall touch each sacred tomb,
And voices shout at last—The Dawn! The Dawn.

AUGUST, 1916.

GONE WEST

Dedicated to Lieutenant Rodolphe Lemieux, killed in action August 29, 1918.

I do not think of them—our glorious dead—
As laying tired heads upon the breast
Of a kind mother to be lulled to rest;
I do not see them in a narrow bed
Of alien earth by their own blood dyed red,
But see in their own simple phrase—Gone West—
The words of knights upon a holy quest,
Who saw the light and followed where it led.

Gone West! Scarred warrior hosts go marching by,
Their longing faces turned to greet the light
That glows and burns upon the western sky.
Leaving behind the darkness of the night,
The long day over and the battle won,
They seek for rest beyond the setting sun.

PEACE

Now Peace at last is hovering o'er the world
On silver wings, and golden trumpets blow.
Home from the long crusade the warriors go,—
Victorious knights with banners wide unfurled,
Bow down your head, for these have passed where swirled
Great tides of darkness ebbing too and fro;
Their eyes have seen, 'mid fiery tempests' glow,
How youth at Death its dauntless challenge hurled.

And these are they who saw the Holy Grail,
Brimming with youthful blood like ruddy wine
Poured out in sacrifice. The light divine
Before whose awful glow they did not quail
Now beckons us; and shall our footsteps fail
To follow where they set the blood-stained sign?

NOVEMBER, 1918.

HIDDEN TREASURE

O sun-browned boy with the wondering eyes,
Do you see the blue of the summer skies?
Do you hear the song of the drowsy stream,
As it winds by the shore where the birches gleam?
Then come, come away
From the shadowy bay,
And we'll drift with the stream where the rapids play;
For we are two pirates, fierce and bold,
And we'll capture the hoard of the morning's gold.

A roving craft is our red canoe,
O pirate chief with the eyes of blue;
So hoist your flag with the skull on high,
And out we'll sail where the treasures lie.
For in days of old
Came pirates bold,
With a Spanish galleon's captured gold;
And their boat was wrecked on the river strand,
And its treasures strewn on the silver sand.

Now steady all as we dash along,
The rapids are swift but our paddles are strong;
And soon we'll drift with the water's flow
Where the treasure lies hid in the shallows below.
O, cool and dim,
'Neath its foam-flecked brim,
Is the pool where the swallows dip and skim;
So we'll plunge by the prow of our red canoe
For the treasure that lies in the quivering blue.

Now home once more to the shadowy bay,
For we've captured the gold of the summer's day,
And emeralds green from the banks along,
And silver bars from the white-throat's song.
No pirates bore
Such a glittering store
From the treasure ships of the days of yore,
As the spoils we have won on the shining stream,
While we drifted along in a golden dream.

A RIVER SUNSET

Red sunlight fades from wood and town,
The western sky is crimson-dyed,
Gaunt shadow-ships drift silent down
Upon the river's gleaming tide.

The hills' clear outlines melt away
Or veil themselves in purple light,
And burning thoughts that vexed the day
Become fair visions of the night.

THE MADONNA

She shivered and crouched in the immigrant shed
In the midst of the surging crowd;
Her hands were