HARVEST SONG.

EAST and West the Mother calls-

" Come, my children, to the feast, In my low-roofed Western halls, Under high domes of the East.

I have spread on hill and dale Golden cloth of corn and wheat, Harvests that shall never fail, Garment that no moth can fret.

I have strung my purple beads On the necklace of the vine; I have hung my silver seeds Like the lamps about a shrine.

I have laid the straining root To my heart below the clay; I have held the mellow fruit To the crimson cheek of day.

I have charmed the fetid pools Till they rocked my feathered rice ; And the worms have been my tools, And the morsels of the ice.

I have conjured from the sod Of the steppes, enchanted grain ; And far off, the river god Has for pipes my sugar cane.

I have forced a precious yield From the shades of Egypt's tombs; On Manchuria's yellow field I have tossed my millet plumes."

East and West the mother calls—

"Come my children to the feast In my latest banquet halls

bread—

plain.

We will string you purple beads, Drops from hearts that proudly die; And our flowers of mighty deeds Shall be crimson as the sky."

"Children, hush ! " the mother sighs For their harvest lost and vain— "Where the tree falls there it lies, East and West the children come Proudly with uplifted head. To the hum of battle drum Thus they scorn the Mother's "Prom the clouded mountain tops, From the valleys of the main, Lo a store of goodlier crops That shall clothe your empty By the hillside and the gorge, For your cloth of tarnished gold, As it fell from Vulcan's forge See the sheet of steel unrolled.

You have wept and waited long In the darkness out of sight, But our harvest tall and strong Shall be raised up in a night.

For harmonious shepherd's pipe We shall have a war god's lyre, He will reap the increase ripe With the sickle of his fire.

Gently were your sheaves laid low, Like the sighing of a breeze ; But our sturdier growth shall go With the crash of forest trees.

ELEANOR ALEXANDER.