Poems (Scudder)/The Chine

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THE CHINE
Within the chine where we are summoned now By water tinkling airily and low We find no flower, orchis fleshy pale, Nor arbutus, nor hyacinths that frail Blossom the bare snow-haunted woods amid—The smallest veinings of a maiden's lid Are no more sweet of tint—but moss, yes moss, ​That creeps and pringles like strong silver floss, Or lies in folds of ashen velvet cool, Or crowds the sloping margin of the pool With little eager stars, or poises still Its waxen spheres on stems invisible. And ferns—we get a sudden joy of green Poignant and pure as ever olivine Or carven chrysolite could show. One spreads In fairy benison above our heads From an unthought of cleft and lightly curls Its topmost strands to catch the water-pearls That patter from above. And hoary plumes Of fern we see no greener than the spumes The moon-wan water washes over rocks So lichen-fretted that they seem like blocks Of aged ivory each overwrought With script too fine for mortal eye or thought. The stream-bed's scarcely seen so thickly there The willow-witches shake their fading hair, And every birchling makes a plaintive stir As though a wind had clutched the locks of her. Till we shut in by all this gray and green Wonder indeed if we have ever seen Buttercups, roses, dahlias hundred-pied Or tiger-lilies—if our eyes beside Can ever from this dim enchantment break Or will they less love color for its sake?

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