To the end of the trail / Richard Hovey [electronic text]

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O LADY loved of our sweet sunrise singer Whose name Song speaks with lingering of the lips, Our laureate of the marshes, our light-bringer Out of the darkness of fair Love's eclipse! Out of the jar of ways that Trade has turned Into a mart where Love may have no place Save it be bought and sold, A rare fair soul like a clear lamp burned And shot through the mirk its sudden rays And over the smoke-pit a glimmer of gold Flashed and a voice, like the brook-note of a flute That in its passioning still is pure and cool, Or the clear sharp dropping of water into a pool When all the woods are mute, Spake and the sound thereof Brake through the barrier, Keen as the silver sword of the moon; "Woe to the warrior

Liegeman of Love Found, when the fighting Grows fierce for the victor's boon, Far from the foeman! See where the dark hosts stay for our smiting!" O gracious, queenly, softly-smiling woman! Thee with his light and sweetness this man dowered, To whom the laurel leaf of right belongs. Ah me! and how should I Take from thy hands the branch that greened and flowered More beautifully, tangled in his hair, Amid the city's flowerless throngs, Than when beside the braes of Delaware It swayed beneath the languid sky, Ere it was honored, honoring his songs.