The Joys Of The Road
Bliss Carman
1861 to 1929
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Now the joys of the road are chiefly these:
______ crimson touch on the hard-wood trees;
A vagrant's morning ______ and blue,
In early fall, when the wind walks too;
A shadowy highway cool and brown,
Alluring up and ______ down
From rippled water to dappled swamp,
From purple ______ to scarlet pomp;
The outward eye, the quiet will,
______ the striding heart from hill to hill;
The tempter ______ over the fence;
The cobweb bloom on the yellow quince;
The palish asters along the wood,—
A lyric ______ of solitude;
An open hand, an easy shoe,
And ______ hope to make the day go through,—
Another ______ sleep with, and a third
To wake me up ______ the voice of a bird;
A scrap of gossip ______ the ferry;
A comrade neither glum nor merry,
Who ______ defers and never demands,
But, smiling, takes the world ______ his hands,—
Seeing it good as when God ______ saw
And gave it the weight of his will ______ law.
And oh, the joy that is never won,
______ follows and follows the journeying sun,
By marsh and tide, by meadow and stream,
A will-o'-the-wind, a light-o'-dream,
The ______ smell of the forest loam,
When the stealthy sad-heart ______ go home;
The broad gold wake of the afternoon;
______ silent fleck of the cold new moon;
The sound ______ the hollow sea's release
From stormy tumult to starry peace;
With only another league to wend;
And two brown ______ at the journey's end!
These are the joys of ______ open road—
For him who travels without a load.