THE JOYS OF THE ROAD Bliss Carman Now the joys of the road are chiefly these: A crimson touch on the hardwood trees; A vagrant's morning wide and blue. In early fall, when the wind walks, too; A shadowy highway cool and brown, Alluring up and enticing down From rippled water to dappled swamp, From purple glory to scarlet pomp; The outward eye, the quiet will And the striding hart from hill to hill; The tempter apple over the fence; The cobweb bloom on the yellow quince; The palish asters along the wood, A lyric touch of the solitude; An open hand, an easy shoe, And a hope to make the day go through,- Another to sleep, and a third To wake me up at the voice of a bird; The resonant, far listening morn, And the hoarse whisper of the corn; The crickets mourning their comrades lost, In the nights retreat from the gathering frost; (Or is it their slogan, plaintive and shrill, As they beat on their corselets, valiant still?) A hunger fit for the kings of the sea, And a loaf of bread for Dickon and me; A thirst like that of the Thirsty Sword, And a jug of cider on the board; An idle noon, a bubbling spring, The sea in the pine tops murmuring; A scrap of gossip at the ferry; A comrade neither glum nor merry, Asking nothing, revealing naught, But minting his words from a fund of thought, A keeper of silence eloquent, Needy, yet royally well content, Of the mettled breed, yet abhorring strife, And full of the mellow juice of life, No fidget and no reformer, just A calm observer of ought and must, A lover of books, but a reader of man, No cynic and no charlatan Who never defers and never demands, But, smiling, takes the world in his hands,- Seeing it good as when God first saw And gave it the weight of His will for law. And O the joy that is never won, But follows and follows the journeying sun, By marsh and tide, by meadow and stream, A will-o'-the-wind, a light-o'-dream, Delusion afar, delight anear, From morrow to morrow, from year to year, A jack-o'-lantern, a fairy fire, A dare, a bliss, and a desire! The racy smell of the forest loam, When the stealthy, sad heart leaves go home; (O leaves, O leaves, I am one with you, Of the mould and the sun and the wind and the dew!) The broad gold wake of the afternoon; The silent fleck of the cold new moon; The sound of the hollow sea's release From stormy tumult to starry peace; With only another league to wend; And two brown arms at the journey's end! These are the joys of the open road- For him who travels without a load.