Grey ashes of a crimson flower
Beneath the cedar shed,
The fire, that bloomed in Night's dark bower,
No more may raise its head.
Drawn by the magpie's mellow call,
The Morn with rosy feet
Comes, when the white gum shadows fall,
Her truant swain to meet.

She whispers to me, Love you're late,
I've waited long for you,
But you had made the Night your mate,
And yet no solace knew;
I breathe upon your fevered brain,
And kiss your troubled eyes,
Take for awhile, your youth again,
With all its rich surmise.

Godlike I lie upon the grass,
And with the moments toy,
While o'er the hills the cloudlets pass,
And down the vale deploy;
And fancy after fancy blows,
In thought's rich flowering clime
The hour is as a budding rose,
In that strange garden, Time.

And loud through ill the valley rings,
(While transient opals gleam
Above the grave oak's whisperings)
The voice of Tambo stream
Deep-voiced, and clear his madrigal,—
Roaming with current strong
He dances down a shallow fall,
And sings a Pagan song.

The blood-red lories sing a stave,
And flit like arrows past,
And in the amber of the wave,
Strange fleeting jewels cast;
And glad and lone, the friar thrush
A morning mass intones,

In his green shrine of dogwood brush,
Hung o'er wave-silvered stones.

The sky is one huge violet,
That only morning grows,
And by the ranges purpled fret,
The moon's lost lily shows,
While tolls the bell-bird's silver bell,
Where wattles hint at bloom,
From some unravished mountain dell,
Steals vestaline perfume.

Proudly, and slow, huge wings outspread,
Seeking the distant vales,
With regal pomp, and restless head,
The wedge-tailed eagle sails.
As thought commanded to the earth,
To find, and skyward lead
To minister to some god's mirth,
Another Ganymede.

I see massed flowers awaiting birth,
The seed dream of the tree,
I hear the step in caves of earth,
Of free Persephone;
And feel the air strange music holds,
Of songs unborn, that die,
Each spent, before its soul unfolds,
To charm the waiting sky.

Till lo, my spirit spreadeth wings,
And throws its vesture by,
And tones the song the wild bird sings,
Is in the she-oak sigh.
Trails in the air a woodland scent,
Dreams in the waking bloom,
And slowly scales the firmament,
A cloud, an eagle plume.