POETRY.
THE WESTERN PIONEER.
I CAN hear the willows whispering, 'way down the Arctic
slope, Every shivering little leaflet grey with fear; There's no colour in the heavens, and on earth there seems no hope, And the shadow of the winter's on the year.
An' it's lonesome, lonesome, lonesome, when the russet gold is shed, An' the naked world stands waiting for the Doom ; With the northern witch-fires dancing in the silence overhead, An' my camp-fire just an island in the gloom.
When the very bears are hiding from the Terror that's to come, An' the unseen wings above me whistle south ; When except the groaning pine-trees and the willows, Nature's dumb, And the river roadway freezes to its mouth.
But I cannot strike the home trail. I would not if I could, An' I want no other's smoke across my sky ;
When I drop, l'll drop alone, as alone I've allus stood. On the frontier where I've led, let me lie.
I wouldn't know men's language, I couldn't think their thought, I couldn't bear the hurry of mankind ; Where every acre's built on, where all God made is bought, And they'd almost make a hireling of the wind.
I've been alias in the lead since I grew grass high, Since my father's prairie schooner left the Known For a port beyond the sky line, never seen by human eye, Where God, and God's creation dwell alone.
'Way back I heard men callin' ; one woman's voice was fond, An' the rich lands towards harvest murmured " Rest."
But a sweeter voice kept callin' from the Unexplored Beyond, A wild voice in the mountains callin' "West."
I heard it in the foothills—then I climbed the Great Divide ; In the canyon—then I faced the rapid's roar ; In the little breeze at dawning, in the dusk at eventide, The voice that kept a callin' went before.
My crooked hands are empty, my six-foot frame is bent, There ain't nothing but my trail to leave behind, An' the voice that I have followed has not told me what it meant, An' the eyes that sought a sign are nearly blind.
But I hear it callin' still, as I lay me down to rest, An' I dream the Voice I love has never lied, That I hear a people comin', the Great People of the West, An' maybe %vas His Voice callin' one to guide.
CLIVE PHILLIPPS.WOLLEY.
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