A Would=Be Wanderer

Voices call—
I cry, "I come!"
After all
I stay at home.
Why cannot I throw my cares away,
And journey forth like Paragot
Long roads where tall, straight poplars grow,
And the sun beats white on the road all day?

Rest at an inn (if it come my way),
For I'll walk any road I please,
Chanting verse from Euripides,
Or Villon's ballads of yesterday.

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Or loll Bohemian-wise and dream
About Verlaine or Baudelaire—
A poet strange, with pea-green hair,
Who supped, o'nights, from a skull of eream.

And on out of France and into Spain,
Seeking castles I once built there;
Finding them where they always were,
Up in the air with the clouds and rain.

From castanets with their dizzy click,
Away with feet that never tire,
Till I've fulfilled my heart's desire,
Tho' roads be rocky and rain-mist thick.

To look right well into lives and ways,
To try to understand the earth.
To learn the import and the worth
Of the little deeds that fill our days.

Then, following still my calling voice.
Hear the world's winds in many woods,
And satisfy my many moods,
And feel my life grow, and so rejoice!
Voices call,
I cry, "I come!"
After all
I stay at home.

—M.L.N.