Bliss Carman (1861-1929)
Earth Voices
I
1I heard the spring wind whisper
2Above the brushwood fire,
3"The world is made forever
4Of transport and desire.
5"I am the breath of being,
6The primal urge of things;
7I am the whirl of star dust,
8I am the lift of wings.
9"I am the splendid impulse
10That comes before the thought,
11The joy and exaltation
12Wherein the life is caught.
13"Across the sleeping furrows
14I call the buried seed,
15And blade and bud and blossom
16Awaken at my need.
17"Within the dying ashes
18I blow the sacred spark,
19And make the hearts of lovers
20To leap against the dark."
II
21I heard the spring light whisper
22Above the dancing stream,
23"The world is made forever
24In likeness of a dream.
25"I am the law of planets,
26I am the guide of man;
27The evening and the morning
28Are fashioned to my plan.
29"I tint the dawn with crimson,
30I tinge the sea with blue;
31My track is in the desert,
32My trail is in the dew.
33"I paint the hills with color,
34And in my magic dome
35I light the star of evening
36To steer the traveller home.
37"Within the house of being,
38I feed the lamp of truth
39With tales of ancient wisdom
40And prophecies of youth."
III
41I heard the spring rain murmur
42Above the roadside flower,
43"The world is made forever
44In melody and power.
45"I keep the rhythmic measure
46That marks the steps of time,
47And all my toil is fashioned
48To symmetry and rhyme.
49"I plow the untilled upland,
50I ripe the seeding grass,
51And fill the leafy forest
52With music as I pass.
53"I hew the raw, rough granite
54To loveliness of line,
55And when my work is finished,
56Behold, it is divine!
57"I am the master-builder
58In whom the ages trust.
59I lift the lost perfection
60To blossom from the dust."
IV
61Then Earth to them made answer,
62As with a slow refrain
63Born of the blended voices
64Of wind and sun and rain,
65"This is the law of being
66That links the threefold chain:
67The life we give to beauty
68Returns to us again."
Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.
Original text: Bliss Carman, April Airs: A Book of New England Lyrics (1916; Boston: Small, Maynard, 1920), pp. 4-7. PS 8455 A7A8 Robarts Library.
First publication date:
1916
RPO poem editor: Ian Lancashire
RP edition: RPO 1998.
Recent editing: 4:2002/1/26
Composition date:
May
1913
Rhyme: abcb
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