Poems By Arjava

Strange Enchantment

''THROUGH tranced hours the meadowsweet with summer-burdened plumes

Had lulled the day to drowsiness—only the bee presumes

To ripple through the stillness, as yonder dragonfly

Will kiss the pool to dimples, then zoom toward the sky.

In quiet mid-stream a lily fleet, new-launched by summer glee,

Now slept becalmed beneath the boughs of one lone alder tree ;

While like the youth Narcissus the brooklime on the marge

Peered, blue-eyed, in the mirror framed by water-lily targe.

From further bank rose willowherb and iris torch aglow —

And spearmint, where the waterhen plied softly to and fro :

Till these, with mazy motion of beetles on the stream,

Wove o'er me strange enchantment; I heard as in a dream

With downward plop a water-rat ferried across the stream ;

And I being ferried with it, losing the magic dream,

Felt—landed on the earthward side—still cadenced in the heart

Enticing tunes un trafficked-in by any earthly mart.