JUANITA.
Joaquin Miller
ou will come my bird, Bonita? - Come! For I by steep and stone
- Have built such nest for you, Juanita,
- As not eagle bird hath known.
- Rugged! Rugged as Parnassus!
- Rude, as all roads I have trod—
- Yet are steeps and stone-strewn passes
- Smooth o'er head, and nearest God.
- Here black thunders of my cañon
- Shake its walls in Titan wars!
- Here white sea-born clouds companion
- With such peaks as know the stars!
- Here madrona, manzanita—
- Here the snarling chaparral
- House and hang o'er steeps, Juanita,
- Where the gaunt wolf loved to dwell!
- Dear, I took these trackless masses
- Fresh from Him who fashioned them;
- Wrought in rock, and hewed fair passes.
- Flower set, as sets a gem.
- Aye, I built in woe. God willed it;
- Woe that passeth ghosts of guilt;
- Yet I built as His birds builded—
- Builded, singing as I built.
- All is finished! Roads of flowers
- Wait your loyal little feet.
- All completed? Nay, the hours
- Till you come are incomplete.
- Steep below me lies the valley.
- Deep below me lies the town,
- Where great sea-ships ride and rally.
- And the world walks up and down.
- O, the sea of lights far streaming
- When the thousand flags are furled—
- When the gleaming bay lies dreaming
- As it duplicates the world!
- You will come my dearest, truest?
- Come my sovereign queen of ten;
- My blue skies will then be bluest;
- My white rose be whitest then:
- Then the song! Ah, then the saber
- Flashing up the walls of night!
- Hate of wrong and love of neighbor-'
- Rhymes of battle for the Right!
- The Hights, Cal.