Poem by Clinton Scollard

A Day for Wandering

I set apart a day for wandering; 
I heard the woodlands ring, 
The hidden white-throat sing, 
And the harmonic West, 
Beyond a far hill-crest,         
Touch its Aeolian string. 
Remote from all the brawl and bruit of men, 
The iron tongue of Trade, 
I followed the clear calling of a wren 
Deep to the bosom of a sheltered glade,   
Where interwoven branches spread a shade 
Of soft cool beryl like the evening seas 
Unruffled by the breeze. 
And there—and there— 
I watched the maiden-hair,   
The pale blue iris-grass, 
The water-spider in its pause and pass 
Upon a pool that like a mirror was. 
 
I took for confidant 
The diligent ant   
Threading the clover and the sorrel aisles; 
For me were all the smiles 
Of the sequestered blossoms there abloom— 
Chalice and crown and plume; 
I drank the ripe rich attars blurred and blent,   
And won—Content!

1. The Mist and the Sea
2. Night Song by the Sea
3. The Way of the Cross
4. The Wind of Mourne
5. The Hunter

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