Page:Poems Dorr.djvu/353

But a strange tale is in the wind
Of an old man whose life has been
Shut up wild solitudes within.
On Alpine mountains. He has found.
What I have sought the world around.
A learned, godly man, he knows.
How the full tide of being flows;
And he, in some mysterious way,
Makes, if he cannot find, the clay.
He will his secret share with me—
I go to him, Hermione!"

"But, Valdemar," she cried, "time flies,
And while you dream, the vision dies!
And look! Our children suffer lack;
There is no coat for Claudio's back;
Theresa's little feet, unshod,
Are torn by shards on which they trod;
And Marcius cried but yesterday
When the lads mocked him at their play.
The very house is crumbling down;
The broken hearth-stone needs repair;
The roof is open to the air—
It wakes the laughter of the town!
O Valdemar! if you must go
Up to those trackless fields of snow,
Mould first from yonder common clay
Something to keep the wolf away—
A Virgin for some humble shrine,
A soldier clad in armor fine,
Or even such toys as Andrefels
To laughing, wondering children sells."

"Now murmur not, Hermione,
But be thou patient," answered he.