TRAILING JUNIPER 



when we were boys. I had always thought of it 

 wreathed round the head of Petrarch until now, 

 and now it crept out of the snow patches and into 

 my memory as festoons wrought by white fingers 

 for merry days and nights, and specially made to 

 throw back from its shining leaves the splendours 

 of our wood fires. We cut and hacked at it, and 

 loaded ourselves with triumphant branches, and 



set out homeward, leaving the invisible Griselle, 



o y 



with much reluctance and many lookings back, to 

 go her way. 



Can a man I mean a mature man be a 

 poet in desire without having a pure and lovely 

 form ahead of him, baffling him ? I often thought 

 afterward how fortunate it was that 1 had not come 

 suddenly upon Griselle in the winter walk with my 

 load of ideals. What stumbling foolishness might 



D 



I not have committed ! What wreck and ruin 

 might I not have made of the unattainable, de 

 scending in one evil moment to melodramatic 

 frenzy, rushing at her and shouting, &quot; Be mine 

 be mine.&quot; Be sure I would have wreathed the 

 kalmia about her and danced in my own moon 

 madness like a destroying satyr. 



It was much better for the ideal that she should 

 shimmer indistinctly, and that we should hang the 

 kalmia up like mistletoe in our cabin and wait. 

 There was an airy gulf to be patiently crossed. 



How old was Leander when he swam the Hel 

 lespont ? I ll have to look that up. But what 

 use ? 



Then the late rains set in, chilly and continuous. 

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