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You never ran awayTo sit for hours with gray menWho talked of Hong-Kong and SumatraOf Singapore and JavaAs one talks of the corner groceryOr the cobbler next street.You never had idle ships and wharvesAnd empty granite warehousesFor playgroundsNor roamed through greatThree-story houses with infinite rooms,All full of dust of the departedWhere even the mice were venerable.
All this I did, andI can see Salem.I would like to show it to you,But if I touch it,It crumbles.
The NationH. C. Gauss


PRAYER
O thou elementalRain, sun, and body of the quick warm earth:Hear these words from the cells of thy blood,Multitudinous, various!
Let the waters at the dim roots of the grass be sweet,And the milk be abundant in the breasts of time—Yet a little while, till the pearl-gray banners of smokeBe dissolved, and the flowing of rivulets be but a distant murmurIn the shout and the far white splendor of thy coming.

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