A Santa Barbara Day in Winter [pp. 172-175]

1893.J A ~~~ita Borbc~ra Paji i,i!Kiiifri. 17~
Like one great olive branch the whole earth smiled and shone, and shook
In the wide wind heaven-sent, that kindly swooping, took
All b~aten, storm-crushed things, and brushed, and smoothed, and swept,
Whilst out from shaded nook and crease all scared things crept.
Salt airs play gently over slender rush and rustling leaves
Warm mountain breath tangled`mid eucalypti grieves;
And the trim, taper blackbird leaping to the stile,
Stands dressed in blues and blacks, swift shoaling sheen the while.
Mark well how slender wings like jeweled draperies backward fall;
Hark to the liquid jocund sweetness of his call!
Still on through canons' mottled shade we thread our way,
(?~reat walls of green shadowing the radiant day.
Whilst tiny, lissom lizards dart and flash in rainbow light
From out the moss-grown, creviced rock, then back to night.
Clear water runs, and here the faint flushed virginal bloom
Of pale, wild lilacs lights the odor-haunted gloom.
Into the broad, bright, traveled way slowly we drift at last.
On either sloping side, ribbons of springing grass,
That gently bring us to a sadly darkening door,
Where waving eucalypti stand around, before,
(Anarding the silent city of the dead full well.
Mounting the cliff-top`neath the gleam and gloom, then fell
A pall of silence o'er us, chill and dull,- when lo,
The noble height was gained, we drew keen breath, for 0,
Wide, wide, a heaving sea of sapph~re rolled ablaze,
A baptism of new life and power and sweet amaze.