The Heart of the Lakes

THERE are crags that loom like spectres
Half under the sun and the mist,
There are beaches that gleam and glisten,
There are ears that open to listen,
And lips held up to be kissed.

There are miles and miles of waters
That throb like a woman's breast,
With a glad harmonious motion,
Like happiness caught at rest ;
As if a heart beat under
In love with its own glad rest,
Beating and beating for ever
Outward to east and to west.

There are forests that kneel for ever,
Robed in the dreamiest haze
That God sends down in the Summer
To mantle the gold of its days ;
Kneeling and leaning for ever
In winding and sinuous bays.

There are birds that like smoke-drift hover
With a strange and bodeful cry,
Into the dream and the distance
Of the marshes that southward lie,
With their lonely lagoons and rivers,
Far under the reeling sky.