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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
GENIUS LOCI, by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN Poet's Biography First Line: What wood-god, on this water's mossy curb Last Line: Behold, I seem, and am no more a man. | |||
I WHAT wood-god, on this water's mossy curb, Lost in reflections of earth's loveliness, Did I, just now, unconsciously disturb? I who haphazard, wandering at a guess, Came on this spot, wherein with gold and flame Of buds and blooms the season writes its name. -- Ah me! could I have seen him ere alarm Of my approach aroused him from his calm! As he, part Hamadryad and, mayhap, Part Faun, lay here; who left the shadow warm As a wood-rose, and filled the air with balm Of his wild breath as with ethereal sap. II Does not the moss retain some slight impress, Green-dented down, of where he lay or trod? Do not the flowers, so reticent, confess With conscious looks the contact of a god? Does not the very water garrulously Boast the indulgence of a deity? And, hark! in burly beech and sycamore How all the birds proclaim it! and the leaves Rejoice with clappings of their myriad hands! And shall not I believe, too, and adore, With such wide proof? -- Yea, though my soul perceives No evident presence, still it understands. III And for a while it moves me to lie down Here on the spot his god-head sanctified: Mayhap some dream he dreamed may linger, brown And young as joy, around the forest side; Some dream within whose heart lives no disdain For such as I whose love is sweet and sane; That may repeat, so none but I may hear -- As one might tell a pearl-strung rosary -- Some epic that the leaves have learned to croon, Some lyric whispered in the wild-flower's ear, Whose murmurous lines are sung by bird and bee, And all the insects of the night and noon. IV For, all around me, upon field and hill, Enchantment lies as of mysterious flutes; As if the music of a god's goodwill Had taken on material attributes In blooms, like chords; and in the water-gleam, That runs its silvery scales on every stream; In sunbeam bars, up which the butterfly, A golden note, vibrates then flutters on -- Inaudible tunes, blown on the pipes of Pan, That have assumed a visible entity, And drugged the air with beauty so, a Faun, Behold, I seem, and am no more a man. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A COIGN OF THE FOREST by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN A DREAM SHAPE by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN A FALLEN BEECH by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN A FLOWER OF THE FIELDS by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN A NIGHT IN JUNE by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN A SLEET-STORM IN MAY by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN A TWILIGHT MOTH by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN ADVENTURERS by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN AFTER RAIN by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN ALONG THE OHIO by MADISON JULIUS CAWEIN |
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