  I stand upon the morning’s rim, And all life’s dream within me thrills; I am the cup whose beaded brim The wine of living holds or spills: I stand upon the morning’s rim, When day grows rose and night is dim. There comes a freshness from the floor Of ocean and the night-bathed land; A spirit swings each roseate door With winnowing wings and odours bland: Rose flames enkindle heaven’s floor, And the grey mists are night no more. I stand upon the morning’s verge, And feel the glorious waking world; Afar I hear life’s thundering surge On morning’s beaches maddening hurled, In flame-tinged beauty, where the verge Of ocean sings melodious dirge. I stand at morning’s rim and know That all this dream of earth and sea, These clouds and dreamy fields below, This azure sphere, were made for me: That all are mine that morn doth know, The airs that brood, the blades that grow. I walk in fields knee-deep in grass, Where heavenward elms spread their arms; I dream the airs of morning pass, With voices from a hundred farms: The bobolink rises from the grass, Brim with the melody morning has. I wander by the shade of woods, In roadways brown and wet with dew— The great cool, leafy solitudes; My heart grows great and lonely too, With the large wisdom of the woods, Full of the morning’s haunted moods. The world grows faint and far away, As morning grows a dream at noon; Here the great silences do pray, With spread arms in a voiceless swoon: The fields gleam out and far away Across the hum and hush of day. I breathe life’s airs and feel my heart Leap into being, like a brook That from a mountain crag doth start, And falls in snowy thunders shook: So all earth’s glories in my heart Surge outward, nature’s counterpart. The over-moving fields of blue, They are the dreams that God hath spread, With dews and fires of morning too, Far out around above my head: I feel their deep, far-lifting blue, Shot with the morning’s radiance through. Here in the brooding earth I dream The great, high visions of the soul; Strong like the swerved tide of the stream, Broad like the morn’s unbroken whole: Majestic hopes of life I dream, Such visions great a god might deem. So clear the river’s eye is clear, So strong and fresh the smell of earth, So gladly heaven hovers near, Great thoughts could scarcely fail of birth: The very soul grows crystal clear, Like some pure, spring-fed mountain mere. Out here across this wind-blown land, Where all is great and glad and new, I feel my spirit’s wings expand Like eagle’s under heaven’s blue: Great with the strength of sea and land, I grasp life’s problems in my hand. Back downward to the world I go, Filled with the glory of earth’s light; No demon dread can overthrow, No dreams of evil e’er affright: To battle with my fate I go, Across the days of strife and woe. No frosts of wintry age can chill, No deeps of midnight swirl me down; The fires of Spring my being thrill, The dreams of morning fence me round: By blue, blue brooks that never chill, I climb for aye a summer hill. I climb and listen to a song, Sung by a bird at Summer’s dawn, A song that holds no note of wrong, Dreamed from the world where love hath gone: I listen, listen till that song, Like God’s voice, makes the years more strong. |
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