EVENING ON THE POTOMAC.

The fervid breath of our flushed Southern May

Is sweet upon the city's throat and lips,

As a lover's whose tired arm slips

Listlessly over the shoulder of a queen.

Far away

The river melts in the unseen.

Oh, beautiful Girl-City, how she dips

Her feet in the stream

With a touch that is half a kiss and half a dream!

Her face is very fair,

With flowers for smiles and sunlight in her hair.

My westland flower-town, how serene she is!

Here on this hill from which I look at her,

All is still as if a worshipper

Left at some shrine his offering.

Soft winds kiss

My cheek with a slow lingering.

A luring whisper where the laurels stir

Wiles my heart back to woodland-ward again.

But lo,

Across the sky the sunset couriers run,

And I remain

To watch the imperial pageant of the Sun

Mock me, an impotent Cortez here below,

With splendors of its vaster Mexico.

O Eldorado of the templed clouds!

O golden city of the western sky!

Not like the Spaniard would I storm thy gates;

Not like the babe stretch chubby hands and cry

To have thee for a toy; but far from crowds,

Like my Faun brother in the ferny glen,

Peer from the wood's edge while thy glory waits,

And in the darkening thickets plunge again.