MAYA

Pale sampans up the river glide,

With set sails vanishing and slow;

In the blue west the mountains hide,

As visions that too soon will go.

Across the rice-lands, flooded deep,

The peasant peacefully wades on —

As, in unfurrowed vales of sleep,

A phantom out of voidness drawn.

Over the temple cawing flies

The crow with carrion in his beak.

Buddha within lifts not his eyes

In pity or reproval meek;

Nor, in the bamboos, where they bow

A respite from the blinding sun,

The old priest — dreaming painless how

Nirvana's calm will come when won.

“All is illusion, Maya, all

The world of will,” the spent East seems

Whispering in me; “and the call

Of Life is but a call of dreams.”