And its long luxuriant thought
Dwelling there for years and years,
Long red reaches of the cane,
Under blue unbroken skies,
Rapturous souls of perfume, hurled
Waving from green zone to zone,
Growing, flowering, and flying,
Binding fern and coco-tree,
Trackless, untraversed, unknown,
Who can say what thing it bears?
And ripe under-worlds deliver
Wave-like, palm by palm is stirred,
All one brotherhood hath wrought,
Hold the enchanted secret theirs:
While a single vast liana
In the wide leaves' restless world.
Lofty palm to palm hath taught,
Living in each boundless place,
Is the country of the palm,
Over wonders of its own;
And the flower in soft explosion
Fig-tree, buttress-tree, banana,
Mysteries in many a shade,
With the flower hath been wed.
And the great night comes replying.
Yellow winding water-lane,
Many thousand years have been,
Crossing forest and savannah,
Changeless through the centuries.
And the sun alone hath seen,
But the crimson bird hath fed
Like a high and radiant ocean,
All the fair palm world in motion;
Lisp and murmur back again,
And the day sings one rich word,
Dwarf cane and tall marití.
Blazing bird and blooming flower,
With its mate of equal red,
Up to where green oceans quiver
Verdant isle and amber river,
Crowned with sunset and sunrise,
Hollow haunt and hidden bower
Closed alike to sun and shower.
Mighty, luminous, and calm
And the bird sings to the bird,
Who is ruler of each race
Glowing, revelling, and dying?
Life and death and dream have made