Arctic Gentian.
Reading edition
Beyond the reach of the timberline, The long trail lifting, lifting, Past wizened gardens of low gaunt pine, Crouching out of the great storm’s path: The last tree flees from the arctic wrath, But on is the white trail lifting. Cities and rivers and fields beseem A fantasy, fading, fading, Lost away in the myth of a dream: And the wide land reaches beyond our eyes, A Navajo carpet of strange soft dyes: Patterned with cities the great web lies, Woven with fantasies, fading. Rolls in the tide and the cloud waves toss, The reach of the long land merging: Where the still white surges part and cross The quivering vistas seem to be Of a lost land under the waves of a sea. O summit flower, what strange waves toss Below in the long, long surging!
