Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, OSTRA, by ELLEN FRANCES BALDWIN


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

OSTRA, by                    
First Line: Ostara! Ostara! Strange voices crept
Last Line: The noble frankincense of springtime again.
Subject(s): Animals; Nature


Ostara! Ostara! strange voices crept
Up from the horizon's curve-hidden lands;
Trees stricken and barren reached dumbly toward life
At the call and the urge of invisible hands.
Unbroken the hidden Ostara's sleep,
While the winds of the world searched vale and steep.

Ostara! Ostara! the flecked sky
Looked royally down from her loveliest blue.
In softly breathed accents, the whispers of night
Fell gently as manna and lightly as dew.
Yet the sleeping Ostara kept to her dreams,
Unheeding the night and the noonday gleams.

Ostara! Ostara! the great sea called,
While reaching and grasping with cold white hands,
From a shoreless center where space meets space
To its bound of crags and rimming sands.
The sonorous voice of the roving sea
Called, but in vain, where Ostara might be.

Ostara! Ostara! the voice of life
Sought her and found her, and finding her, spoke.
Her heart beat close to the ever-young heart
Of Ostara, the goddess, who smiling awoke.
She arose in her robes like a banner unfurled,
To the song of the spring, to the chant of the world.

So Life and Ostara, now hand in hand,
Moved over the girdle of sea and earth;
Ostara giving of youth and of hope
Where Life had first given the wonder of birth.
Then softly arose in the wake of the twain
The noble frankincense of springtime again.





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