The Bowing Dyke

Sea-widowed lands more fair than Tantramar!
Winter's green providence in July's sun!
The clattering steel till all was over and done,
Flashed on thy breast from dawn to evening star.
Soon herds of sweet-breathed kine of sere Canard,
Whose eager hoofs the hasting morn outrun,
Sea of lush clover aftermath has won,
And golden-girdled bees anear and far.

Lo, as the harvest moon comes up the sky,
Her shield of argent mellowed to the rim,
The phantom of the buried tide doth flow;
And without noise of wave or sea-bird's cry
Fills all thy ancient channels to the brim,
Thy levels of a thousand years ago!