| Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895. |
| |
| Afoot |
| | | Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts (1860–1943) |
| |
| |
| COMES the lure of green things growing, | |
| Comes the call of waters flowing— | |
| And the wayfarer desire | |
| Moves and wakes and would be going. | |
| |
| Hark the migrant hosts of June | 5 |
| Marching nearer noon by noon! | |
| Hark the gossip of the grasses | |
| Bivouacked beneath the moon! | |
| |
| Long the quest and far the ending | |
| When my wayfarer is wending— | 10 |
| When desire is once afoot, | |
| Doom behind and dream attending! | |
| |
| In his ears the phantom chime | |
| Of incommunicable rhyme, | |
| He shall chase the fleeting camp-fires | 15 |
| Of the Bedouins of Time. | |
| |
| Farer by uncharted ways, | |
| Dumb as death to plaint or praise, | |
| Unreturning he shall journey, | |
| Fellow to the nights and days; | 20 |
| |
| Till upon the outer bar | |
| Stilled the moaning currents are, | |
| Till the flame achieves the zenith, | |
| Till the moth attains the star, | |
| |
| Till through laughter and through tears | 25 |
| Fair the final peace appears, | |
| And about the watered pastures | |
| Sink to sleep the nomad years! | |
| |
|
|
|
