The Singer’s Confession

ONCE he cried to all the hills and waters And the tossing grain and tufted grasses: 'Take my message—tell it to my brothers! Stricken mute I cannot speak my message. When the evening wind comes back from ocean, Singing surf-songs, to Earth's fragrant bosom, And the beautiful young human creatures Gather at the mother feet of Nature, Gazing with their pure and wistful faces, Tell the old heroic human story. When they weary of the wheels of science, Grinding, jangling their harsh dissonances,— Stones and bones and alkalis and atoms,— Sing to them of human hope and passion; And the soul divine, whose incarnation, Born of love—alas! my message stumbles, Faints on faltering lips: Oh, speak it for me!' Then a hush fell; and around about him Suddenly he felt the mighty shadow Of the hills, like grave and silent pity; And, as one who sees without regarding, The wide wind went over him and left him, And the brook, repeating low, 'His message!' Babbled, as it fled, a quiet laughter. What was he, that he had touched their message— Theirs, who had been chanting it forever: With whose organ-tones the human spirit Had eternally been overflowing! Then, with shame that stung in cheek and forehead, Slow he crept away. And now he listens, Mute and still, to hear them tell their message— All the holy hills and sacred waters; When the sea-wind swings its evening censer, Till the misty incense hides the altar And the long-robed shadows, lowly kneeling.